The Kraken are one of three teams yet to complete a head coaching change this offseason, alongside the Bruins and Penguins. They might be getting closer to a decision, though. Former Islanders bench boss Lane Lambert has emerged as Seattle’s preferred candidate after his recent interview with the team “went well,” Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet said on Monday’s 32 Thoughts podcast.
Lambert was part of a recent round of interviews in the state of Washington that also included Capitals assistant Mitch Love and Penguins assistant David Quinn. They were previously linked to Rick Tocchet before he accepted a five-year offer from the Flyers. David Pagnotta of The Fourth Period added that they completed an interview with Jeff Blashill before he was named the Blackhawks’ new head coach last week.
A name with previous head coaching experience is presumably desirable for the Kraken. They’re looking for more structured play from their entire skater group after the club’s possession numbers nosedived under Dan Bylsma last season, leading to his firing after one year behind the Seattle bench.
While Quinn fits that criteria too, Lambert’s year-and-a-half stint in New York as the lead man carries a more impressive resume in the areas they’re looking at. In his only full season behind the Islanders bench in 2022-23, Lambert elevated a club that missed the playoffs the year prior in the final season of Barry Trotz’s tenure by nine points in the standings, enough to get them back in the postseason. They did so with improved two-way play, still below-average defensively but boosting their scoring chance production enough to remain above water at 5-on-5.
Of course, the Islanders fired Lambert and replaced him with Patrick Roy midway through the 2023-24 season after a 19-15-11 start to the campaign. He spent last year in Toronto as Maple Leafs head coach Craig Berube’s associate coach, managing the forward group that helped produce the league’s seventh-ranked offense.
Lambert would be the third head coach in the Kraken’s five-year franchise history if hired. Dave Hakstol served behind the bench for their first three seasons in the league before being fired and replaced with Bylsma last summer.
Image courtesy of Brad Penner-Imagn Images.
With the crap talent Ron Francis put together no coach will be successful. But Francis gets promoted because he kisses the owners butt.
I mean…. they ARE an expansion team. Didn’t the Lightning finish at the bottom of the league for a long time? And the Panthers took a very long time to establish themselves. The Blue Jackets have never even made the conference finals. Not every expansion team is going to be the Knights. I’m cutting the Kraken a little slack here on roster construction.
What is with all the Francis haters? If you are a Hurricanes fan, he built a perinneal top playoff team there. His draft picks are only now starting to work their way up. I don’t understand what you were expecting?
Lots of Francis haters for some reason. I’ve never understood why. It will be years before we know whether he’s done a good job. Everybody wants to talk about the players he picked right away. Far more important will be the scouting, player development, and analytic departments he formed. Starting with nothing, in a brand new organization,it’s that organization he should be graded on. If, five years from now,Seattle is a good organization we should remember to give him some of the credit.
The league told the Kraken that the expansion fees were high because they would be able to draft talent and have a competitive team out the gate…inorder to charge the ticket prices they ask they needed to be promised they would have a team the fans would pay for…
This was not the case for the Kraken…the team sucks and they charge way too much…
So the Kraken failed the season ticket holder’s big time.
Let face it, the ownership does not hire capable people…three loser coaches and now a loser President in Francis…he has never delivered yet he is our leader…
Never delivered? Are you aware that, in season two, the Kraken won 46 games, knocked the defending champs out of the playoffs, and took Dallas to game seven in the second round? I remember many Kraken fans being excited about what was being delivered at that point.
~O_o~
hakstol guided this “plucky” talentless team to the second round .. and francis fired him .. guess it’s next retread up .. wonder how many coaches he’ll burn through before he’s finally relieved of his GM duties ?
I remember when you called Bruce Cassidy and Paul Maurice poor hires because they were retreads.
Francis was unlucky to follow vegas. Teams learned not to give real assets to either take or keep 4-5 defense /6-7 forward.
And the league allowed this telling the Kraken management they would get a ‘great’ team for the expansion fees they demanded.
If that’s true, then the league overpromised and the Kraken ownership group got scammed. But I don’t think that’s really the case — it’s more that nhl franchises are worth a lot more year over year and the Kraken are already a good investment, worth hundreds of millions more than the expansion fee.
Regardless, that has nothing to do with the expansion draft and Francis’s ability to build a team from it. Sweetg is right: teams adjusted their strategy after the Knights draft. The Jackets stopped handing out NMCs because got handcuffed by NMCs so they had to “trick” the Knights into taking Karlsson. There are whole articles about this.
I’m not a Kraken fan, but it would be ridiculous to expect too much out of this team, considering they’re an expansion team that only joined the league a couple of years ago. They need a couple years in the basement to stock talent. The Knights were very much the outlier not the norm.
Please tell us how the folks at the NHL could guarantee that the Kraken would get a great team if they did not know which players would be on the roster.
I don’t think arguing that someone’s possible “success” in 5 years justifies uninspiring decision making in the present.. but for those who do, I can see why they would feel compelled to defend Francis as that seems to be his job security. I’m more of the opinion that so much can change in 5 years in nhl that it’s basically an illogical approach. Panthers and Knights resoundingly prove that quality draft picks don’t equal cup wins. If the Canes can squeak out a cup win in the next year or two, I still don’t think Francis gets credit for that. He’s been gone too long already. In terms of Lane Lambert, it’s a “meh” hire, so I can see the fit, unfortunately. I’d rather take another lap with Disco Dan, but what I’d really like is Mitch Love though I can’t imagine anyone with other options would really want the job.
Firing Bylsma after one season definitely shows Francis was incompetent; either Bylsma wasn’t a good fit or he was given too little rope…