PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – Even former Penguins players were saying openly that the Pens needed to make a coaching change and on Friday they did. President of Hockey Operations and GM Kyle Dubas announced they fired associate head coach Todd Reirden, the coach in charge of the power play.
The unit was historically bad this year. The power play finished hitting at 15.3% which was 30th in the NHL. It’s a group with Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Erik Karlsson, Jake Guentzel-for a part of the season. It’s the first time under 20% since 2019-20 when it was 19.9%. Even in the 20-win seasons the Pens were hitting around 18%.
The last time they had a worse power play was 2001-02. Among the players on that team-Kris Beech, Shean Donovan, Milan Kraft, Eric Meloche, Dan LaCouture.
"We are grateful to Todd for his dedication and commitment to the Penguins over two separate stints with the organization," said Dubas in a statement released by the team. "Mike Sullivan and I have spent time over the past two weeks evaluating the coaching staff, and although these decisions are never easy, we agree that this change was in the best interest of the team moving forward."