‘That was a management decision’: Bruce Cassidy reflects on Bruins firing, potential influence from Boston’s veterans
"That's their call. It worked out great for me."
There have been plenty of narratives spun around Bruce Cassidy and his relationship with several younger players in the Bruins locker room — a sour sentiment that could have played a role in his surprise firing last June.
But on Wednesday, Cassidy pushed back against questions over whether Boston’s veteran leaders could have saved his job had they backed him up.
“They’re gonna have opinions and should, and I don’t put it on Bergy or any one player here,” Cassidy said during an appearance on WEEI’s “The Greg Hill Show”. “That was a management decision, I feel. That’s how I looked at it. I’ve remained close with some of those players, and we’ll always have a friendship.
“They played hard for me and our staff in Boston, so I don’t look at it that way. I just feel like Donny [Sweeney] and Cam [Neely], they felt they needed a different voice. I think that’s what they came out and said. At the time, I disagreed, but that’s their call. It worked out great for me. So, at the end of the day, I think it was just their right to do that.”
Of course, Cassidy has earned the last laugh in the wake of his ousting. While the Bruins’ record-setting regular season came to a crashing halt in the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, Cassidy and the Golden Knights hoisted the Cup during their bench boss’ first season in Vegas.
Even with the abrupt way in which his tenure in Boston ended, Cassidy acknowledged that he is still close with many players linked with Boston.
After Vegas took down the Florida Panthers in the Stanley Cup Final, Cassidy said that he received texts from Patrice Bergeron, Brad Marchand, David Pastrnak, Charlie McAvoy, Zdeno Chara, Torey Krug, and others after winning his sought-after title.
When he was fielding job offers just days after the Bruins handed him a pink slip, Cassidy said that he told teams to reach out to Bruins players to vouch for him.
“I don’t know the conversation, but they did call because I told them to,” Cassidy said of Bergeron reportedly singing Cassidy’s praises after Vegas hired him. “Because after what happened, there’s some things that I wanted to make sure that whoever I interviewed with – and I did with a number of teams – hey, here’s some players to call.
“You can call anyone, but I think there’s a team that called Pasta as well, just because there’s some stuff out there that I wanted to correct from players that I coached for a while. So, they had a conversation for sure.”
Cassidy is bringing the Stanley Cup back to Massachusetts on Thursday. The former B’s coach is using his day with hockey’s greatest prize to bring it to Glover Elementary School in Milton to help launch the Cassidy Murray Foundation, a newly created non-profit organization.
The foundation is named for 13-year-old Cassidy Murray. Murray, a friend of Cassidy’s daughter, Shannon, passed away in 2022 following a tragic boating accident.
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