Montreal Canadiens: Giving Joel Bouchard more incentive to join
By Omar L
Joel Bouchard has been one of the names linked to joining the Montreal Canadiens organization, and perhaps the recent signings are a part of his recruitment.
The firing of Sylvain Lefebvre was the first managerial change in the Montreal Canadiens organization. Seeing as how poor of a season the Laval Rocket had, and the lack of success of the Habs AHL farm team as a whole, something had to give. The search to replace Lefebvre has boiled down to several names including Joel Bouchard.
There haven’t been any signs of a front-runner for the job, but many have Dominique Ducharme in the driver’s seat of the discussion. However, other teams may be in his orbit of interest. According to Stephane Leroux of RDS, Ducharme had a meeting with the Washington Capitals for their vacant AHL head coach position. The Hershey Bears finished last in the Atlantic Division with 69 points missing the playoffs for the first time since the 2013/14 season.
Capitals general manager Brian MacLellan announced that the team would not be renewing the contracts of head coach Troy Mann and Ryan Murphy (assistant coach), making Hershey a destination for opportunity as well. MacLellan is looking for a change in development considering the number of AHL players who have come up to play. Ducharme has the track record to do that in his success with young talent in the QMJHL and the World Juniors.
Perhaps the Montreal Canadiens know that Ducharme is out of their reach and have made Bouchard their number one guy. If so, it would provide some more context to the recent signings besides the obvious need to add young skill. Alexandre Alain would’ve been a player the Habs signed whether Bouchard was available or not. However, it may sway him a bit to have one of his top players with him in a transition to professional coaching.
The same goes for new signings T.J. Melancon and Morgan Adams-Moisan. Both have spent time playing for Blainville-Boisbriand Armada which would provide Bouchard with some familiarity with the new job. There’s also the emotional aspect of it in which he would get to grow some of these players further that he’s spent so much time with, Alain in particular who has been a top contributor.
Obviously, the odds of Bouchard signing with the Laval Rocket aren’t any different than him signing elsewhere. Similar to Ducharme, there could be other offers and meetings that have already happened. But nailing two birds with one stone in adding this skill while possible giving Bouchard more incentive to take the job is as strong as a positive as we’ve seen in the last few weeks.