Bruce Cassidy is still looking for his next NHL opportunity, but the door isn’t fully in his hands just yet.
After being fired by the Vegas Golden Knights late last season, Cassidy has drawn interest elsewhere, including the Edmonton Oilers and Los Angeles Kings in the offseason. But Vegas stopped both teams from speaking with him, and that leaves Cassidy waiting for his former club to decide whether he gets another shot.
“Nothing’s changed,” Cassidy told TSN Hockey Insider Pierre LeBrun in The Athletic of his current situation. “They have to give permission.
That’s how they left it. So, there’s nowhere to go with that until a potential opportunity comes up.
We’ll see where it goes. We’ll see if something comes up.
We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it, you know?”
Cassidy’s exit came on Mar. 30, with only eight games left in the regular season. He had guided the Golden Knights to the 2023 Stanley Cup, but Vegas moved on and hired John Tortorella, who then took the team to the Stanley Cup Final before his contract was not renewed.
For now, Cassidy is keeping busy in a different job. His contract with the Golden Knights runs through this season, and he’s currently working with Canada’s women’s national team as it prepares for the World Championship in November.
Hockey Canada brought him in last month as an advisor to general manager Danielle Sauvageau, though most of his day-to-day focus has been on helping new head coach Kori Cheverie.
Cassidy said the time with the women’s program is something he hopes will help him grow as a coach.
He had instant success in Vegas, winning the Stanley Cup in his first season, but the next three years didn’t bring that same result. Looking back, he pointed to the challenge of keeping the message sharp after reaching the top.
“You win the Cup, you want to stay at that standard. How do you get that message across without pushing the guys (too far) and trusting they know what it looks like to win?”
Cassidy said, reflecting on his tenure. “The first year after the Cup, you do that, and you lose early in the playoffs - you’re like, ‘OK, we’re not the same team.
We’ve got to move on. We’re not the defending champs anymore.’
“So how are you messaging that every day and yet the guys in the room know they’ve won, and they know what it takes? I think that was the biggest challenge in years three and four, that I would self-reflect and maybe say I should have done it this way or that way.”
Cassidy’s NHL resume also includes coaching the Boston Bruins from 2016 to 2022 and a two-year run as bench boss of the Washington Capitals from 2002 to 2004.
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