BOSTON – Robbie Ftorek was fired Wednesday as coach of the Boston Bruins, a team struggling to make the playoffs after a strong start.
General manager Mike O’Connell, who replaces Ftorek on an interim basis, said he had seen inconsistent effort and too many mistakes. The Bruins’ 2-1 loss to Phoenix on Tuesday was the last straw, said O’Connell, who said he’ll “simplify” the team’s game plan, stressing fundamentals, checking and consistency.
The Bruins had the NHL’s best record at 19-4-3-1 on Dec. 8, but slipped to 33-28-8-4 and into seventh place in the Eastern Conference after Tuesday’s loss.
Ftorek, in his second season as Boston’s coach, was the Bruins’ 10th coach in 18 years. The team also fired assistant coach Jim Hughes but kept assistant Wayne Cashman. Mike Sullivan, head coach of the Bruins’ AHL affiliate in Providence, R.I., was promoted to assistant in Boston, and Scott Gordon was named Providence head coach.
O’Connell said he wanted to stick with Ftorek through the end of the season, but felt he had to make a change.
“Really for me, it started with … the way we came out last night and played in a game I thought was critical, and for the life of me I couldn’t understand why that is,” O’Connell said. “I’ve seen it too many times, and regardless of what players we have in the lineup, I have to get this team back to working hard on a consistent basis.
“I’ve seen too many times where we have one good period, we’re bad the second and desperate the third,” he said. “If we get in the playoffs we’re not going to go anywhere with that kind of play.”
There was no answer at Ftorek’s home in Wolfeboro, N.H.
O’Connell said he broke the news to Ftorek late Wednesday morning, then addressed the team on the bus. He said he told the team “if I didn’t believe in them, if I didn’t believe they could do better, I wouldn’t have made the change.”
Ftorek became coach in May 2001 after a season in which Pat Burns was fired eight games into his fourth year. His replacement, Mike Keenan, coached the Bruins to their second straight non-playoff season.
A Needham native and one of the best high school hockey players in Massachusetts history, Ftorek led the Bruins to first place in the Eastern Conference last season with a 43-24-6-9 record. But they were eliminated in the first round of the playoffs by Montreal.
The Bruins got off to a strong start this season despite the loss of three key players and before weaknesses in the defense and goaltending surfaced.
Bill Guerin, who scored 41 goals last season, signed as a free agent with Dallas, and defenseman Kyle McLaren held out rather than stay with the Bruins. They also chose not to re-sign goalie Byron Dafoe, who eventually joined Atlanta.
The team has also played most of the season without injured forward Sergei Samsonov. Samsonov, coming off consecutive 70-point seasons, had surgery in December on an injured right wrist.
The loss of Dafoe may have been the most damaging as Boston began the season with goalies Steve Shields and John Grahame, neither a regular starter in the NHL. They shared the job until Grahame was traded to Tampa Bay and McLaren was traded in a deal that brought Jeff Hackett to Boston from Montreal.
Ftorek did have plenty of offense with Joe Thornton, Glen Murray and Brian Rolston. And the defense was more aggressive than it was last season, leading to scoring opportunities.
But after their outstanding start, the Bruins had trouble stopping opponents. Without McLaren, the team lacked a dominant defense-minded defenseman.
The team tried to strengthen its defense by obtaining Dan McGillis from San Jose and Ian Moran from the Pittsburgh Penguins for draft picks at the trading deadline earlier this month, but that wasn’t enough to save Ftorek’s job.
Ftorek’s first NHL head coaching job was with the Los Angeles Kings for the last 52 games in 1987-88 and the entire 1988-89 season.
He then spent five seasons coaching in the AHL and was an assistant with New Jersey for two seasons before taking over as head coach of the Devils in 1998-99. He lasted two seasons there before he was fired with eight games to go in the ’99-’00 season. New Jersey went on to win the Stanley Cup under Larry Robinson.
As a player, Ftorek spent five seasons in the WHA, where he was MVP in 1977 before joining the Quebec Nordiques of the NHL as a free agent in 1979. He also played for the New York Rangers in a six-year NHL career. He finished with 77 goals and 150 assists in the NHL and 216 goals and 307 assists in the WHA.
AP-ES-03-19-03 2047EST
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