Free washer | Hiring Jim Montgomery: like Ken Hitchcock in 2011?

In November 2011, St. Louis Blues general manager Doug Armstrong fired a rather inexperienced coach, Davis Payne, to replace him with a renowned coach, Ken Hitchcock.

The Blues had a relatively young club, with rising stars like Alex Pietrangelo, Kevin Shattenkirk, TJ Oshie, David Perron, Alex Steen, Jaden Schwartz and David Backes. Vladimir Tarasenko was a year away from joining the team.

St. Louis was 6-7 after 13 games, and had missed the playoffs the previous two seasons. Hitchcock’s arrival had an immediate effect. The Blues went 42-15-11 and made the playoffs that year and the next four seasons, with a final four in 2016.

Fourteen years later, almost to the day, Doug Armstrong, now president of hockey operations for the Blues, attempted a similar move. And he doesn’t hide it.

“If Jim Montgomery hadn’t been available, Drew Bannister would still be the Blues coach today, but we had a unique opportunity to get our hands on one of the best in his field,” Armstrong explained Sunday for justify the dismissal of his young person coach.

“He is ready to lead a group on the upward slope, ready to win,” continued the CEO, who is in his last year before retirement. Reminds me a bit of hiring Ken [Hitchcock] around ten years ago, an experienced coach with a young team. He got the best out of this young group. »

Like Davis Payne, Drew Bannister did not have extensive professional hockey experience. He had been head coach with the Blues’ farm club for a few years, and had managed the Soo Greyhounds, in the Ontario Junior League, between 2015 and 2018.

Bannister replaced Craig Berube in December 2023. He was removed as interim head coach on May 7, 2024. He turned things around in St. Louis with a 30-19-5 record. But the Blues are already five points from last place giving access to the playoffs with a record of 9-12-1.

Five days after being fired by the Boston Bruins, Montgomery came to the Blues, his first club as a player, in 1993, before being traded to the Canadiens in exchange for Guy Carbonneau.

But he does not inherit a group as powerful as Hitchcock at the time, no offense to Doug Armstrong. The Blues are obviously counting on a high-quality first center in Robert Thomas, 25 years old, 86 points last year. Jordan Kyrou, 26, is a winger capable of scoring around thirty goals and amassing 70 points or more per season. Jake Neighbors, 22, scored 27 goals last year. Pavel Buchnevich is a good offensive contributor, without being a star, but he will turn 30 in April.

But the second center, Brayden Schenn, is 33 years old. Radek Faksa, center of the third line, is also in his thirties and generally does not amass more than 20 points per year.

There’s no Pietrangelo on defense, but 31-year-old Colton Parayko appears to be enjoying a renaissance that could allow him to reach 30 points for only the second time since 2018. Philip Broberg, obtained from the Edmonton Oilers after that he had been given a hostile offer, had a big start before getting injured. Otherwise, the defense gets old.

Among the team’s top prospects is defenseman Adam Jiricek, the 2024 first-round pick, 16^e overall, and forwards Dalibor Dvorsky, Otto Stenberg, Jimmy Snuggerud and Zachary Bolduc.

The Blues have missed the playoffs the last two seasons. Armstrong, a fan of resets, not rebuilds, has been able to draft five times in the first round in the last three vintages, and eight times in the second and third rounds, but he has not drawn in the top nine since the selection of Alex Pietrangelo in 2008.

Since their unexpected conquest of the Stanley Cup in 2019, the Blues have made the playoffs three times in five years, but they have made it past the first round only once.

To revive the Blues, Jim Montgomery will need goaltender Jordan Binnington, whose performance has been ordinary since the start of the season with a record of 6-9-1, a GAA of 3.04 and a save percentage of .891 . Binnington, 31, was never able to repeat his 2019 exploits.

Alex Steen, already on the decision-making committee, will take over from Doug Armstrong at the end of the season.