The Estevan Bruins announced this morning that they are not renewing the contract of head coach and general manager Keith Cassidy.
Cassidy, 38, had a mutual option for a third year on the two-year contract he signed in April 2011, which the Bruins' executive decided not to exercise. The decision came during a board meeting on Wednesday night.
"We would like to thank Keith for his contributions to the Bruins organization. Keith played a key role in the team's transition to Spectra Place and has been a strong ambassador in the community," said president Jeff Pierson in a statement.
"However this is a results based business and there is no getting around the fact the past year was a disappointing one. We feel our fans deserve a winning team and we will take all steps necessary to make that happen."
Pierson added that the search for a new head coach and GM will begin immediately.
Cassidy, a Winnipeg native, spent two years at the helm after being chosen to lead the team through a rebuild.
In his first year behind the bench, a youthful Bruins squad finished fourth in the Sherwood Conference. They swept the Notre Dame Hounds in the survivor series before being swept by the first-place Weyburn Red Wings in the next round.
With only three 20-year-olds graduating and a plethora of youngsters expected to step up their contributions, expectations were high for the Bruins heading into the 2012-13 season. But they struggled from the beginning and finished fifth in the Sherwood.
They would get past the Kindersley Klippers in the survivor series, but then lost in five games to the Yorkton Terriers.
The Bruins posted a regular season record of 49-57-4-2 under Cassidy, for a winning percentage of .437.
In an interview this afternoon, Pierson said the Bruins owe it to the community to ice a winning team.
"I think as an executive, we just felt the club needed to go in a little bit of a different direction moving forward. Obviously this year didn't meet our expectations and we really feel that this community deserves a winning hockey club," he said.
Asked why the board didn't give Cassidy one more year to prove himself by exercising the option on his contract, Pierson said, speaking personally, "I wasn't willing to take a chance."
"We've gotta be very mindful of the community that supports this hockey club and we need to deliver a winner to the city of Estevan," he added.
The Bruins have done a notoriously poor job of maintaining continuity behind the bench throughout their history, but Pierson said that wasn't a good enough reason to maintain the status quo.
"I don't think the executive was prepared to move forward for the sake of continuity, but jeopardizing the future performance of the hockey club."
Pierson noted that Cassidy's strong record in the MJHL didn't translate well to the SJHL and suggested that the team needs to look for coaches who have succeeded in better leagues.
"Obviously, we need to bring in a guy with a proven track record, and when I say that, I think we gotta look at where that track record was established.
"You want a coach that can walk that fine line between the players still respecting him, but demanding and holding them to a high level. That's a tricky thing, but I think it's what's needed to be a winning hockey club," he continued.
I'll post the full audio from Pierson's interview tonight. See next week's Mercury for full story.
On a personal note, I want to say it was a pleasure dealing with Keith the last two years. Of all the coaches I've dealt with (not that it's a long list), Keith was by far the most easygoing and accessible. He's one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet, and that probably came across on our Bruins Banter TV interviews.
I wrote a lot of negative things about the Bruins this year in a trying season, and he never got angry with me about it. He understood, better than most, that the media has a job to do and he always made it clear he was grateful for the coverage, good or bad.
Although the coaching gig didn't work out for him in Estevan, Keith's a first-class individual and wherever he winds up next, I wish him nothing but the best.
