Washington (AFP) – John Tortorella, the NHL’s oldest head coach at age 66, was fired by the Philadelphia Flyers on Thursday, two days after the team’s 11th loss in 12 games. Associate coach Brad Shaw, a 60-year-old Canadian, will replace Tortorella on an interim basis for the final three weeks of the 2024-25 season. Tortorella was in his third season coaching the Flyers, who lost 7-2 to Toronto on Tuesday, their sixth consecutive loss. They have one win, 10 losses, and an overtime loss in their past 12 games and haven’t won a game in regulation time since February 25, falling to 28-36-9 and last in the Metropolitan division.
“Today I made the very difficult decision to move on from John as our head coach,” Flyers general manager Daniel Briere said. “John played a vital role in our rebuild. He set a standard of play and re-established what it means to be a Philadelphia Flyer.” The Flyers are set to miss the playoffs for a fifth season in a row. “As we move into the next chapter of this rebuild, I felt this was the best for our team to move forward,” Briere said. “I’d like to thank John for his tireless work and commitment to the Flyers.”
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Tortorella has a career NHL coaching record of 770-648 with 165 overtime losses and 37 ties since starting his career in 2000 as a mid-season replacement guiding the New York Rangers. He coached Tampa Bay to a Stanley Cup in 2004 and also has coached Vancouver and Columbus. The Flyers’ power play ranks third-worst in the league at 13.7 percent, and they have been outscored 52-21 in the past 12 games. “When you’re in this type of situation and you’re losing all the time and there’s nothing at the end of the tunnel for you, there’s certainly going to be some frustration,” Tortorella said after Tuesday’s loss. “This falls on me.”
Tortorella, who went 97-107-33 in three seasons with Philadelphia, is the first U.S.-born coach to reach 1,600 NHL games and stands sixth in NHL history with 1,620 games. He won NHL Coach of the Year honors in 2004 and 2017. “We fully support Danny’s decision in making this change as he continues to do what is needed for the future of our organization,” said Flyers president of hockey operations Keith Jones. Shaw will have his second head-coaching stint in the NHL after replacing Steve Sterling with the New York Islanders 42 games into the 2005-06 season and going 18-18-4. Tortorella became the fifth NHL coach fired this season, the first since Derek Lalonde by Detroit on December 26.
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