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Bob Hartley

Bob Hartley Hired By KHL’s Avangard Omsk

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Veteran coach Bob Hartley is headed back to the professional ranks. European hockey insider Igor Eronko reports that Hartley has been hired by Avangard Omsk of the KHL. This marks his first pro head coaching job since he was fired by the Calgary Flames back in 2016.

Hartley has had a highly successful coaching career and brings an immense amount of pedigree to Omsk. After working his way up through the QMJHL and AHL, Hartley was given his first NHL head coaching gig by the Colorado Avalanche in 1998. In his first four seasons with the Avs, Hartley guided the team to four straight conference finals and a Stanley Cup championship in 2001. When Hartley was fired mid-season by Colorado in 2002-03, he was hired almost immediately by the Atlanta Thrashers, where he coached for parts of six seasons. Hartley was out of the NHL for just one season – during which he won the NLA championship with the ZSC Lions – before he returned as the head coach of the Calgary Flames in 2012. Hartley won the 2015 Jack Adams Award as the best coach in the league for his work reinvigorating the Flames. Altogether, Hartley has a .568 winning percentage in the NHL and has reached the postseason six times.

For the past two years, Hartley has been working for the Latvian national team. He was the head coach for each of their past two World Championship entries and also consulted on their junior program. In this most recent World Championships, Latvia surprised many with a 3-1-1-2 record and seventh-place finish. Hartley’s coaching was back in the eye of the mainstream media and it is no surprise that he has landed a new job as a result. With Avangard, Hartley will take over a roster that has some good pieces, including a very solid defense, but is quite far from being a true contender. If he is able to turn the team around and improve on a twelfth-place finish last year without any further additions to the roster, it will be yet another impressive addition to his coaching resume. Don’t be surprised to see Hartley back in the conversation for an NHL job in the near future if he finds success during his KHL tenure.

Bob Hartley Signs Five Year Extension To Coach Latvia’s National Team

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Although he finds himself without a current coaching job in the NHL, Bob Hartley will still be behind the bench for a while to come.  He has agreed to stay on as the bench boss for the Latvian Hockey Federation for the next five years, notes Martin Merk on the IIHF’s official website.

Hartley was brought in shortly after Latvia failed to qualify for the upcoming Winter Olympics and was behind the bench at the World Championships back in May.  At that time, Hartley didn’t want to commit to a longer-term deal in case another opportunity presented itself there but now he will be able to give their developing program some stability in the years to come.

The 56-year-old has over 1,000 games of NHL experience (between the regular season and playoffs) with a points percentage of .554 during the regular season.  Hartley also won a Stanley Cup with Colorado back in 2001 and the Jack Adams Award for Coach of the Year with Calgary.

This isn’t the first time that the Latvian Federation has had someone with NHL experience behind the bench for their national team.  Ted Nolan, who had a pair of stints as head coach with Buffalo plus one with the Islanders, coached Latvia’s entries in the 2012 and 2013 Worlds as well as the qualification tournament for the 2014 Olympics.

Snapshots: Joseph, Hartley, Blackhawks

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The Tampa Bay Lightning announced the signing of prospect winger Mathieu Joseph to a three year, entry-level contract.  Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Joseph was Tampa’s fourth round pick (120th overall) in the 2015 NHL Entry Draft.  He is in his fourth season at the junior level, with Saint John of the QMJHL.  Through 29 games this season, Joseph has 25 goals (tied for the league lead) and 20 assists along with a +23 rating.  He will be participating in the World Juniors for Team Canada which begins on Monday.

Unless Joseph plays in ten or more games with Tampa Bay this season which is quite unlikely, his contract will slide a year and begin in the 2017-18 season.

Other notes from around the league:

  • While coach Bob Hartley recently agreed to coach the Latvian national team, he is not viewing the opportunity as a long-term option, he told Sportsnet’s Mark Spector. Hartley will be behind the bench for the World Championships in May but intends to pursue another NHL position this summer.  Spector notes that Hartley has declined offers from Switzerland and the KHL but wouldn’t rule out extending his one year deal in Latvia for a second season if he’s unsuccessful in finding a spot back in North America.
  • If Chicago wants to find a way to re-sign left winger Artemi Panarin beyond this season, the Blackhawks will likely have to shake up their core to find the salary cap space to do so. While many have speculated that one of their skaters would have to go, ESPN’s Craig Custance suggests an alternate route in a reader mailbag (Insider required).  He opines that moving Corey Crawford and re-signing Scott Darling to go with a cheaper goalie tandem may be the best way to go.  Darling is still largely unproven at the NHL level with only 65 games under his belt including the playoffs but fared relatively well as the starter in ten games while Corey Crawford was out following an appendectomy, going 6-3-1 with a 2.12 GAA and a .930 SV% during that span.

Bob Hartley To Coach Latvia

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Bob Hartley, the 2015 Jack Adams Trophy winner, will be named the head coach of the Latvian national team, according to Aivis Kalniņš.

According to Kalniņš, all that’s left to do is sign the contract. In an interesting note, Sportsnet’s Mark Spector notes that Hartley was chosen over finalists Patrick Roy and Ron Rolston.

The legendary Avalanche goaltender resigned as the team’s coach in August over disagreements on player decisions like the Nick Holden trade. Rolston has previously coached college hockey, several AHL teams, and the Buffalo Sabres.

Hartley, a veteran of nearly 1000 NHL games, most recently coached the Calgary Flames, but was fired last summer after missing the playoffs. His Jack Adams trophy came following the 2014-15 season where the Flames rode unsustainable percentages and got to the second round of the playoffs. Hartley has previously won the Stanley Cup with the Colorado Avalanche in 2001.

Hartley is a good coach to motivate Latvian players, who will have to out-work their opponents in order to have a chance against highly-skilled international teams. Former Latvian coach Ted Nolan and goaltender Kristers Gudlevskis nearly managed to beat Canada at the 2014 Sochi Olympics; Canada’s 2-1 win was one of the most exciting games of the entire tournament. Latvia was able to score on Canada, which is something that international powerhouses USA and Sweden was not able to do.

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