The 2025-26 season will be the last for longtime New York Rangers goalie coach Benoit Allaire per a team announcement. Allaire will stick around the team through the NHL Draft and start of free agency, per Peter Baugh of The Athletic, before he calls a 29-year career in the NHL to a close.
Allaire has overseen some of the NHL’s top goaltenders in their rise to a starting role. His career began as a goaltending coach with the Montreal Canadiens in 1996. Right away, Allaire was involved in notable NHL careers, working with 20-year-olds Jose Theodore and Tomas Vokoun. Both were overshadowed by a 22-year-old Jocelyn Thibault, who played 61 games of the 1996-97 season.
Theodore and Vokoun went on to play in 647 and 700 games in their NHL careers respectively, while Allaire jumped to the Phoenix Coyotes for their second season in 1997-98. He joined forces with Nikolai Khabibulin, who was in his third season as Phoenix’s starter. Khabibulin allowed the most goals in the NHL (184) in 1997-98 – but, after a year with Allaire, reached a .923 save percentage in 63 games of the 1998-99 season. That mark would stand as the highest in Khabibulin’s 18-year career in the NHL, though he moved to the Tampa Bay Lightning for 2000-01. Allaire stayed in Phoenix for five more seasons, leaning on Sean Burke to fill the Coyotes’ crease until Brian Boucher moved to Phoenix in 2002-03.
With the Coyotes goalie room stabilized by Boucher, Burke, and Brent Johnson – Allaire moved to the Rangers ahead of the 2005-06 season. It was on Broadway that Allaire would build his legacy. He took over goalie coach duties in Henrik Lundqvist‘s rookie season. Lundqvist finished the year as a Vezina Trophy finalist, and fourth in Calder Trophy voting, after recording 30 wins and a .922 save percentage in 53 games. He was an immediate star who would move through the 2010s as a perennial Vezina candidate with save percentages consistently north of .920. With Lundqvist’s career fading as 2020 approached, Allaire’s attention turned towards finding his next star. That successor would be Igor Shesterkin, who has seamlessly taken over Lundqvist’s spot on annual Vezina ballots. Shesterkin has a career .917 save percentage in 325 games, including a .912 in 51 games this season.
Allaire has molded countless goaltenders into long-term, NHL starters. He also worked with Kevin Weekes, Cam Talbot, Alexandar Georgiev, and Antti Raanta. His name rings loud in NHL circles and the Rangers will feel the absence of their Director of Goaltending. New York promoted Allaire to a full-time, director role in the 2024-25 season. In the same year, they promoted Hartford Wolf Pack goalie coach Jeff Malcolm to the top flight. Malcolm is a veteran of the Hartford lineup as a player and coach – and has spent the last two seasons learning how to make up for Allaire’s eventual retirement. He will take the reins moving forward, while the Rangers will be able to rely on Shesterkin, who is signed through the 2032-33 season.