Claude Julien ‘never felt’ there was a chance he may not return to Bruins

Winslow Townson for The Boston Globe

By Jeff Pini @JeffPini

June 10, 2015

3 minutes to read

Claude Julien’s status on the Bruins’ bench next season may have only been confirmed last week, but the Bruins coach never believed his job was in jeopardy.

Speaking with the media on Wednesday, Julien said he felt confident he would be returning to coach the Bruins this season even after a disappointing 2014-15 campaign and the hiring of a new general manager.

“There’s never a guarantee, but I’m going to be honest with you: I never felt that way,’’ he told reporters when asked if he thought there was a chance he may not return. “Was there doubts or question marks? Absolutely, because you don’t know who’s coming in and what they want to do. But I never felt threatened here. I think the people around me have shown me that they seem to have enough confidence that I didn’t really feel that way.’’

Julien’s coaching record with the Bruins over the past eight seasons has been impressive, with his 351 wins behind only Art Ross for the most in franchise history, a legend he could pass this season.

“We know what Art Ross’s name means around the league, so at the same time, as nice as an honor as that would be and [I] would feel privileged about it, I also always take into consideration the era where all these things have taken place,’’ he said. “It would be an honor, but certainly wouldn’t compare myself to him because he worked in a different era and he still deserves the accolades that he’s had all along.’’

After Mike Babcock left the Detroit Red Wings this offseason to become to Toronto Maple Leafs’ bench boss, Julien became the longest-tenured coach in the NHL.

“It just means that I’m probably the next one to fall off the totem pole, right?’’ Julien joked when asked his thoughts on the subject. “That’s basically it. So I’m going to try to make it last as long as I can, to be honest with you. As I said before, I love Boston, I love the city, I love the fans — what a great group of fans that we have…They love their team, and everything that I’ve seen around this city from all the sports team around, this is a great city to be in. So I feel privileged to be here, and as I said before, I’d like to make it last as long as I can.’’

Julien knows that in order for the Bruins to get back to being one of the top teams in the NHL, they will need to make some changes to how they play in order to be successful in an evolving league.

“When you talk philosophical approaches, every year so far — and it will continue to be that way — we make adjustments in our game,’’ he said. “The game evolves, the rules change, and again, the personnel of your team changes, so you make adjustments accordingly.

“Ironically enough, two days after the season was done, the coaching staff, we met and we’d already made some adjustments that we felt would probably be something we’d like to see in our game, and Don [Sweeney] happened to come in, and we talked about those things, so we’d already done the work on that. It just goes to show that we were seeing the same things, and that we were all on the same page.’’