Flyers fire head coach John Tortorella after ‘I’m not really interested’ remarks
Tortorella, who was in the third year of a four-contract with the team, leaves his post with a 97-107-33 record.
The writing was on the wall for a while in pencil, but it became permanent Sharpie on Thursday morning when John Tortorella was officially relieved of his coaching duties with the Flyers.
“Today I made the very difficult decision to move on from John as our head coach,” Flyers general manager Danny Brière said in the team’s news release. “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.
“John’s passion on the bench was only equaled by his charitable work in our community. As we move into the next chapter of this rebuild, I felt this was the best for our team to move forward. I’d like to thank John for his tireless work and commitment to the Flyers.”
The move comes amid a spell of 11 losses in 12 games for the Flyers and after Tortorella’s eye-opening remarks Tuesday after a 7-2 loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs. Following the defeat, Tortorella shouldered the blame and said: “I’m not really interested in learning how to coach in this type of season, where we’re at right now.”
» READ MORE: The Flyers didn’t fire John Tortorella. He fired himself. And his timing was right.
But this is where the Flyers are — amid a rebuild.
When Tortorella was hired on June 16, 2022, by then-general manager Chuck Fletcher, the Flyers were still trying to compete. But less than a year later, Fletcher was gone and Brière was in charge. In his introductory press conference, the interim GM used that once taboo “rebuild” term, and things started to change.
“A New Era of Orange” was quickly established with the hiring of former Flyers forward Keith Jones as team president and the elevation of Dan Hilferty to governor. Although they did not hire Tortorella, the trio backed the veteran bench boss at every step for his hard-nosed style while trying to set a new standard for the organization.
But there were certainly missteps along the way.
Last season, Sean Couturier was a healthy scratch not long after being named captain. Like Couturier, several players from Morgan Frost to Bobby Brink were also scratched at times and never got explanations or guidance on corrections. Defenseman Cam York played less than four minutes on Tuesday and was benched after getting outplayed on the Maple Leafs’ first goal.
Tortorella’s handling of Matvei Michkov and other young players — on the ice and to the media — has also come under fire. He made the Russian phenom a healthy scratch in November and at times criticized his defensive-zone play and level of conditioning.
The first American-born head coach to reach 1,500 games, Tortorella led the Flyers for almost three full seasons, going 97-107-33 in 237 regular-season games (.479 points percentage). Associate coach Brad Shaw, who runs the defense and penalty kill, will take over on an interim basis.