Jacques Martin (ice Hockey) - Coaching Career

Coaching Career

He served first as a coach of the Peterborough Petes in the Ontario Hockey League and then with the Guelph Platers (where he won a Memorial Cup in 1986) before being promoted to head coach of the St. Louis Blues of the NHL. Martin served two years in that position and became an assistant coach of the Quebec Nordiques. When the franchise moved to Denver and became the Colorado Avalanche Martin remained for part of the season before being offered the head coaching position in Ottawa (see below). The Avalanche went on to win the Stanley Cup in 1996.

When the Ottawa Senators, a struggling expansion team with a very poor overall record, needed a new head coach in 1996 they hired Martin. Martin led the team to great regular season success (341–255–96), winning the Northeast Division three times and the President's Trophy once. Martin was thrice nominated for the Jack Adams Award for top NHL coach and won it in 1999.

An unfortunate mar on Martin's record was a long period of performing below expectations in the playoffs, although his supporters maintained that the Senators lacked playoff experience. He finally was able to find productivity in the postseason during the 2002 campaign, when the Senators reached the second round and came within one game of the conference finals. He had his most successful postseason in 2003 where the Senators reached game seven of the Eastern Conference finals. After a disappointing 2003–2004 season and an inglorious first round exit from the playoffs Martin was fired. He had been the longest serving coach in the NHL and has turned around a franchise that had gotten off to an awful start as an expansion team.

Martin is a noted defense-first coach who relies on playing a tight defensive game. He made good use of the speedy young talent on Ottawa, and also instills defensive discipline. Despite his reputation as a defensive coach, Ottawa was amongst the top few teams offensively in his last years there. Martin is not a very extroverted coach and is usually soft spoken and lacking much of the fire and charisma of other noted NHL coaches.

On May 26, 2004, Martin was hired as the new head coach of the Florida Panthers, along with his friend Mike Keenan as the new general manager. Martin assumed general manager duties with the resignation of Keenan on September 3, 2006. On March 3, 2007 Jacques Martin coached his 1,000th career NHL game in a 6–2 victory over the Tampa Bay Lightning. In a classy move during the 2002 season, while he was head coach of the Ottawa Senators Jacques Martin stepped away from the bench for 2 games, allowing Hall of Famer Roger Neilson to take the reins and become the ninth man to coach 1,000 career NHL games. As of April 1, 2007, Martin has coached 1009 NHL games, winning 498 (tied for 10th all time among NHL coaches), for a 47.3% winning percentage.

After three seasons serving as the Panthers head coach, the team announced on April 11, 2008 that Martin would not be back as the bench boss for the 2008–09 NHL season.

Martin became the head coach of the Montreal Canadiens on June 1, 2009.

On April 9, 2011, in a 4–1 win over the Toronto Maple Leafs, Martin became the 9th NHL coach to reach the 600th win milestone.

On December 17, 2011, roughly midway through his third season with the team, Martin was fired as coach of the Montreal Canadiens. He was replaced on an interim basis by his assistant coach, Randy Cunneyworth.