Bruce Cassidy is bringing the Stanley Cup to Massachusetts on Thursday, but not as the head coach of the Bruins as he once hoped.
After leading the Vegas Golden Knights to their first Cup this spring, Cassidy is using his day with the trophy to visit Milton and help launch the Cassidy Murray Foundation, a newly created non-profit dedicated to expanding educational opportunities and supporting the mental health needs of individuals navigating unthinkable tragedy.
The foundation is named for 13-year-old Cassidy Murray, a friend of Cassidy's daughter, Shannon, who lived in Milton and died tragically in Aruba in 2022 when she was struck by the boat pulling her and her father on a water tube.
Ahead of his visit, Cassidy took some time to join The Greg Hill Show on Wednesday morning to reflect on Vegas’ Cup celebrations as well as his time in Boston and how and why it came to an end last year. Listen to the full interview below.
Cassidy was asked if he thought Patrice Bergeron or other Bruins veterans could have saved his job if they had come to his defense.
“I don't know… they're gonna have opinions and should, and I don't put it on Bergy or any one player here,” Cassidy said. “That was a management decision, I feel. That's how I looked at it. I've remained close with some of those players, and we'll always have a friendship. They played hard for me and our staff in Boston, so I don't look at it that way. I just feel like Donny [Sweeney] and Cam [Neely], they felt they needed a different voice. I think that's what they came out and said. At the time, I disagreed, but that's their call. It worked out great for me. So, at the end of the day, I think it was just their right to do that.”
Cassidy said he knew there were some Bruins players he had to be “less abrasive” with, but that there were others he didn’t really know had an issue with him until he saw some comments after his firing.
Regardless, Cassidy defended his relationships with most of the Bruins and said there are a number of current and former Boston players he remains friendly with. Among others, he got texts from Bergeron, Brad Marchand, David Pastrnak, Charlie McAvoy, Zdeno Chara, Torey Krug and Sean Kuraly after winning the Cup.
Asked about the story told by Golden Knights president George McPhee about Bergeron telling Mark Stone that Vegas would win the Cup if they hired Cassidy, Cassidy said he was the one who actually encouraged players and management from teams he interviewed with to talk to Bruins players.
“I don't know [the details of] the conversation, but they did call because I told them to,” Cassidy said. “Because after what happened, there's some things that I wanted to make sure that whoever I interviewed with – and I did with a number of teams – hey, here's some players to call. You can call anyone, but I think there's a team that called Pasta as well, just because there’s some stuff out there that I wanted to correct from players that I coached for a while. So, they had a conversation for sure.”
The name that most often gets mentioned when it comes to players clashing with Cassidy is Jake DeBrusk, whose agent went public with a trade request after DeBrusk got healthy-scratched early in the 2021-22 season. DeBrusk’s agent publicly rescinded the trade request shortly after Cassidy got fired.
Cassidy even had good things to say about DeBrusk on Wednesday, though.
“Well, listen, Jake's a good hockey player,” Cassidy said. “My job is to get a lot out of him and that's what we tried to do. I like him as a guy, I really do, and I hope he does well. I’ve got no ill will towards Jake, to be honest with you. He's a good kid, and hopefully he's part of the core here going forward. But like I said, that's out of my hands.”
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