The Montreal Canadiens took a chance on Martin St. Louis when naming him the interim head coach in 2022. Coming off an unexpected Stanley Cup Final appearance, the Canadiens began the next season with an 8-30-7 record, struggling mightily without Shea Weber and Carey Price. Jeff Gorton and Kent Hughes took over as executive vice president of hockey operations and general manager of the team early in the season after Marc Bergervin, Trevor Timmins, and Paul Wilson were all relieved of their duties after the team’s disastrous start. Their first act of business was firing their head coach, Dominique Ducharme, and replacing him with St. Louis, laying the foundation for what the Canadiens would become, and Gorton knew it would work from the start.
During a podcast appearance on the Spittin’ Chiclets, Gorton was asked by Ryan Whitney what was behind the decision to bring in St. Louis, especially considering he had never coached at the professional level before. “I had him as a player, kind of like Yands, and obviously unique. And, he just had this way about him that you felt like there was always going to be a chance to coach,” responded Gorton. He goes on to say that during his time with the New York Rangers, he had offered St. Louis the Hartford Wolf Pack, but turned it down as it did not appeal to him. The next coaching offer Gorton gave St. Louis would be a lot more enticing, so much so that he was willing to take on the Canadiens job with no guarantees that he would stay on past the 2021-22 season.
Gorton was very open about what transpired when he and Hughes first took charge of the Canadiens. “We were pretty bad when we first got there and had kind of promised we wouldn't change coaches. And then just being there for a while, I could see the players' faces. They were dying and we had to change something.” It was time for a rebuild, and the Canadiens were moving in a different direction. The first piece of that puzzle was St. Louis, and he came in on a three-month contract, looking to prove to everyone that he may not have the pedigree of the other coaches available, but he was the right person for this team.
Gorton knew they made the right decision before the first game he ever coached for the team. “Honestly, the first time I ever saw him speak to the team, I was like, whoa, that's pretty good. The guys are going to like that.” St. Louis has this charisma to him, something you catch glimpses of during his post-game press conference or through the videos the Canadiens release of him talking to the team. It might be because he is a former player who has accomplished everything a person can on the ice, but the way he carries himself and his never-quit attitude have spread to the players in the locker room. Gorton and Hughes took a chance, but if you got to watch St. Louis as a player, you knew he was not going to let this opportunity go to waste.
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