Ranking Penguins’ Top Five All-Time Coaches

The Pittsburgh Penguins are conducting their first full-fledged coaching search since 2014, when they settled on Mike Johnston.

While Johnston wasn’t the worst coach the Penguins have had – there are a few contenders for that distinction who make him seem like Toe Blake – GM Kyle Dubas will be hoping to find someone who can be more effective than Johnston was during his season-plus behind the bench.

The Penguins have had a number of those over the years, including a few who have left an indelible mark on not only the team, but the sport. That’s part of the reason that ranking their all-time top five coaches was a challenge.

One intriguing possibility, Herb Brooks, simply wasn’t behind the bench long enough to merit inclusion. Other candidates had generally strong showings, but also at least one failure so egregious that it knocked him out of consideration.

Exhibit A: Marc Boileau, whose team played an entertaining and generally successful style in the mid-1970s, but who presided over just the second club in NHL history to blow a 3-0 lead in a best-of-seven playoff series, which the Penguins did against the New York Islanders in 1975.

Here’s a look at the men who did make the cut:

1. Bob Johnson

The high points: The Penguins had not won so much as a division title between the time they entered the NHL in 1967 and the day GM Craig Patrick hired Johnson in 1990. Less than a year later, they not only had finished atop the Patrick Division, but had claimed the franchise’s first Stanley Cup. And those might not have been Johnson’s most important accomplishments, because he actually changed the team’s culture, infusing the entire organization with positivity and confidence it never had possessed before he arrived. His infectious enthusiasm made believers of everyone around him and the benefits of that endured long after he was gone.

The blemish: The only downside to Johnson’s tenure is that it was so brief, because he was diagnosed with brain cancer while preparing Team USA for the Canada Cup tournament a few months after winning the Cup and died that fall.

2. Mike Sullivan

The high points: He’s the franchise leader in games coached (753) and won (409), as might be expected of a guy who spent more time on the job than any of his predecessors. Sullivan also is the only coach to lead the Penguins to multiple league championships and was behind their bench for nearly a decade, holding onto the job even after two GMs replaced the one who had brought him in, Jim Rutherford.

The blemishes: For all of Sullivan’s early success after replacing Mike Johnston in December, 2015 – he led the Penguins to the franchise’s fourth Cup the following spring and another in 2017 – those triumphs were distant memories by the time he and the Penguins parted ways last week. They failed to qualify for the playoffs in each of his final three seasons and did not win a series in the postseason since Round 1 in 2018.

3. Scotty Bowman

The high point: Bowman, a Hall of Famer and the winningest coach in NHL history, had spent a little more than a year in the Penguins’ front office when Johnson was stricken by the disease that killed him. He agreed to fill in for Johnson, and guided the team to another title the following spring, finishing with a run of 11 consecutive victories that tied a league playoff record.

The blemish: The 1992-93 Penguins had arguably the most talented roster in team history, which probably explains why they won their only Presidents’ Trophy that season, and entered the playoffs on a 17-0-1 run that established them as a popular choice to win a third consecutive Cup. But the New York Islanders upset them during Round 2, with an overtime loss in Game 7 at Mellon Arena (remember David Volek?) proving to be Bowman’s final game as coach.

4. Michel Therrien

The high points: Therrien got the Penguins within two wins of a Cup in 2008, but it was his work in the years leading up to that Final appearance against Detroit that was most impressive. When he replaced Eddie Olczyk as coach in December, 2005, Therrien inherited a club that had lots of promising young talent – headlined by Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Marc-Andre Fleury – on the roster and in the pipeline, but was going through some serious growing pains. Therrien spent several seasons schooling his players on the importance of playing sound team defense, a valuable lesson that endured long after he had moved on.

The blemishes: While he was capable of being quite jocular at times, Therrien was generally gruff and quite demanding. Those are traits that don’t generally lead to a hockey coach having a lengthy shelf life, and when the Penguins were sputtering as the 2008-09 season was nearing the stretch drive, GM Ray Shero decided to replace him.

5. Dan Bylsma

The high point: Bylsma’s tenure began in spectacular fashion, as he took over the club that had been struggling under Therrien and was in real danger of missing the playoffs, and directed it to a Stanley Cup just a few months later. His personable, player-friendly approach was the antithesis of his predecessor’s and his personnel responded well to it.

The blemishes: Unfortunately for Bylsma (and the team), he peaked in 2009. The Penguins qualified for the playoffs in each of the five seasons that followed but, even though Shero often moved aggressively to upgrade the roster at the trade deadline, made it as far as the conference final only once during that span. Even that series was a profound disappointment, as the Penguins generated only two goals while being swept by Boston in four games.