Quote:
Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814
Gulutzan is a bad coach.
Peters is a bad coach.
Greg Gilbert is a bad coach.
Dallas Eakins is a bad coach.
Hartley finished 1st and went to the Conference Finals or better four years in a row. He took a team that was supposed to achieve great things and got them
To achieve great things. He did his job.
Yes, I know those Avs teams were incredible. They weren’t the only ones - Detroit, New Jersey, and Dallas were no less stacked than the Avalanche.
He still had to go through Scotty Bowman, Ken Hitchcock, and he beat Larry Robinson and Prime Marty Brodeur to win his title.
You don’t have to put the guy in the Hall of Fame, but he’s quite clearly not a bad coach.
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In those days, no, no team was as stacked. Detroit was moving between the Yzerman/Federov team and the next generation team. NJD’s best player aside from Brodeur was Patrick Elias. Dallas was post apex, had old Brett Hull, Mike Modano and Joe N. And I’m not sure what you mean by “going through” Bowman and Hitchcock, since their teams lost in upsets to other teams. Detroit lost to LA, Dallas lost to St. Louis. Hartley’s team beat the Canucks, LA, and St. Louis.
But moreover, other coaches have had success with stacked teams and it doesn’t mean they are good coaches. Crisp, Sather, Babcock, etc moved on and had zero success.