3:01 p.m.: The Flyers have made Tocchet’s hiring official. Brière had the following statement:
I am very happy to welcome Rick Tocchet as our head coach. During this process it became clear that Rick was the absolute right coach to lead our team. He has enjoyed the highest level of success both as a player and coach. Rick’s ability to teach and understand his players, combined with his passion for winning, brings out the best in young players at different stages of their development and has earned the respect and confidence of highly talented All-Stars and veteran players alike.
10:32 a.m.: The Flyers are close to announcing Rick Tocchet as their next head coach, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet confirms Wednesday. ESPN’s John Buccigross implied yesterday that things were moving in that direction.
It’s far from an unexpected move from general manager Daniel Brière and the rest of the front office, who were linked to Tocchet almost immediately after firing John Tortorella late in the regular season. Friedman said Monday that things were moving slower than expected for Tocchet landing a new role after not having his option picked up by the Canucks but that he remained high on the list of Philadelphia’s preferred candidates.
Tocchet returns to some familiar stomping grounds in the City of Brotherly Love. He played parts of 11 of his 18 NHL seasons as a player there, ranking 16th in franchise history in scoring with 508 points in 621 games as a Flyer. His now decades-long coaching career hasn’t yet taken him back to Philly, though.
He walks into a familiar situation with the Flyers, who are not quite out of the woods of their rebuild but have aspirations of being so in short order. As was the case in his most recent stops in Arizona and Vancouver, Tocchet assumes control of a forward group with a young, foundational piece in Matvei Michkov, supplemented by some veteran anchors in Sean Couturier and Travis Konecny.
Tocchet brings nine seasons of experience as an NHL head coach to the Flyers’ bench. He’s posted a career 286-265-87 (.516) record in 638 regular-season games, including a Pacific Division title and Coach of the Year honors with the Canucks just one year ago. He began his career with a year-and-a-half stint with the Lightning in the late aughts before resurfacing as Arizona’s head coach in 2017.
While it’s the first big offseason move for the Flyers, it can’t be their only one if they’re serious about improving their record in 2025-26. Their coaching hire’s impact will be virtually invisible if they can’t find a fix to their goaltending situation, which tanked Philly’s otherwise decent control of scoring chances at 5-on-5 last season. The trio of Samuel Ersson, Ivan Fedotov, and Aleksei Kolosov – all of whom remain under contract for next year – combined to allow a staggering 42.5 goals above expected, per MoneyPuck.
Tocchet’s support staff also remains up in the air. The Flyers also let go of two assistants and their skills coach after the season ended. Brad Shaw, who took over as interim head coach for the final few weeks of the season, is expected to stay on as an assistant, Kevin Kurz of The Athletic said last month.
Image courtesy of Nick Turchiaro-Imagn Images.
Well that changed fast. An article this morning said he may go back to tv because of lack of interest haha
Curious what the Flyers believe Tocchet will do to turn things around in Philly?
He’ll be limited in what he can do without an influx of talent across the board. Let’s see how the draft goes and who else DB can bring in from outside the org to help. Just turning around the goaltending situation should provide a boost, BUT the defense in front of the goalie needs significant improvement as well. At a minimum, he should be able to light a fire under Tippett after the poor performance he had in ‘24-25.
Test
bleh
My guess is he would’ve taken the Penguins job if offered (family reasons), but this is a good fit as well.
Outside of this being the most Philly thing they could do, why Tocchet? They need a coach that can develop young players if they actually want to be contending for anything one day. I don’t look at any of his previous stints and think of many development success stories.
He almost made Dylan strome a bust, wouldn’t use him in Arizona
career coaching stats are worse then mike yeo
I don’t see the appeal with this guy when he’s got a losing record plus he doesn’t develop young players good
He was a very popular Flyer and is in the Flyers hall of fame. He did tv for the Flyers. His gritty defensive coaching style appeals to the Philly fans who want the current team to play like it’s still 1975. It’s about going back to the “Flyers Way”. There’s a reason this franchise hasn’t won a cup in 50 years because they keep doing this.
I’m a flyers fan and I totally agree with you. They are chip starved for 50 years. That’s bc ownership never got out of 1975 and the league evolved 4 times over and they have always been late to the table in adapting to league changes. They were big and nursing when the league got small and quick and the examples go on and on. They haven’t had a legit lock down goalie since Pelle and after his death Hextal was the man in the 80s. They played around with a two goalie system in the Lindros years and traded away any really good goalies in recent times.
They Flyers are so irrelevant in the city that they actually need to give a Flyers and NHL 101 course to fans who want to get into them but tuned out due to seasons of the same product resulting in failure. I used to know the league, the stars and the players coming up. But in a city where there are four sports to enjoy, the team that’s invests the least into their team and lets fans down loses followers. I enjoyed Tockett as a player but as a coach, I’m not in favor of the former beloved player. Sooner or later their playing day heroics pass gets eliminated if they don’t win. Think Bill Barber, for the Sixers Mo Cheeks and the Phillies Larry Bowa. They were all embraced then eventually hated in the end or made to look crazy or inept. The Flyers need 4 legit stars in free agency (2 offensive players and 2 defensive players) and a really good goalie. Solidify three strong lines. There is no time for a 4 year plan. If that is the case, they should move the team and say good bye. They have been given time, now patience has run out.
Meant to say big and bruising.
Flyers should try to grab maxim shabanov is he comes to nhl from khl put up good numbers just a smaller forward see how he plays
Not surprisingly Briere made another poor decision.