We’ll start by stating the obvious – as of right now, Ralph Krueger is still the head coach of the Buffalo Sabres. That being said, after his team has posted a record of 2-7-1 in their last 10 games, his seat is becoming increasingly warm. Some are already approaching his eventual ousting as a foregone conclusion as fan ire  continues to rise.

Let’s assume that Krueger does receive his walking paper before the conclusion of the 2020-21 campaign. The Sabres are fortunate in the sense that there are three very accomplished head coaches currently available for hire in Bruce Boudreau, Claude Julien, and Gerard Gallant.

These names have certainly made the rounds on Sabres Twitter over the last few weeks. The most common questions brought up by fans pertain to what type of style these coaches have run in the past. Specifically, which of them run high-event, low-event, or more adaptable systems.

These are fair questions. Seeing these inquiries inspired me to dig a little bit deeper in order to obtain concrete answers in the underlying data. So, let’s dive into their historical metrics and see what we can find.

Bruce Boudreau

Quick Stats

Career Regular Season Record | 567-302-115

Playoff Qualification Rate | 71.4-percent (10 out of 14 seasons)

Average Team xGF Percentage | 52.39 % (since 2010)

We’ll kick things off with a candidate who has coached his teams to the most superficially impressive analytics success in the 66-year-old Boudreau. To say that his Minnesota Wild teams were defensively proficient during his time behind the bench, would be an understatement.

In his four full seasons with the club, the Wild were the top-ranked xGA team in the NHL three times. The one year they did not hold that distinction (his last in Minnesota), they ranked second. Obviously, the Wild have had one of the more talented blue lines in the league for some time. Still, that type of consistency and sheer defensive dominance cannot be glossed-over.

What’s interesting about this is the fact that the Wild experienced similar rates of defensive success prior to Boudreau’s arrival when Mike Yeo was calling the shots.

(Chart below shows MIN metrics under Yeo from 2013-2016, and Boudreau from 2016-2020)

Where these two coaches differed was on offense. Yeo’s teams were always on the fringe of playoff contention because, quite frankly, they couldn’t score. Boudreau’s teams certainly weren’t what you’d call offensively dynamic, but he did manage to push them near the middle of the pack in terms of xGF rate during his time there.

Overall, the Wild were the top-ranked five-on-five xG team in the league from 2016-2020 (i.e. Boudreau’s tenure) at a whopping 54.23-percent. It’s also worth noting that Yeo and Boudreau had a lot of core player overlap, so it’s not like he had a newly renovated depth chart when he arrived. Players like Zach Parise, Mikko Koivu, Jared Spurgeon, Ryan Suter, and Matt Dumba all spanned both of their respective tenures.

If we go even further, back to 2011-2016 when Boudreau was the head coach of the Anaheim Ducks, his group was analytically strong, even then. In that span, Anaheim posted the tenth-best team xG rate in the NHL at 51.9-percent (five-on-five). Interestingly enough, his Ducks teams actually improved from an expected-goal differential every year he was there.

So, we know that Boudreau has squeezed some historically strong impacts out of his teams, but how? There is a perception out there that he ran a “low-event” system, but that’s not really the case. In reality, he just always had strong defensive depth.

He’s probably more of a medium-event coach who can adapt his approach based on the talent at his disposal. His Ducks teams attained solid xG marks due to their offensive prowess, while his Wild teams did so by extinguishing scoring opportunities-against.

You might be asking yourself – if Boudreau’s teams were such analytics darlings, why did they never dominate in the standings? The most appropriate answer is probably goaltending.

During his time with the Wild in particular, his goaltending tandem was atrocious, posting an overall save-percentage of just 90.71-percent in all-situations from 2016-2020. Given how good those Minnesota teams were at thwarting danger, that result is very poor.

Gerard Gallant

Quick Stats

Career Regular Season Record | 270-216-51 (Plus 4 Ties)

Playoff Qualification Rate | 22.2-percent (2 out of 9 seasons)

Average Team xGF Percentage | 51.90% (since 2014)

Everyone remembers Gallant from his three-year stint with the Vegas Golden Knights. Prior to his success there, he was sort of an obscure candidate, never really icing a productive team in his past head coaching ventures with the Columbus Blue Jackets (2003-2007) and Florida Panthers (2014-2017).

Since advanced metrics weren’t a thing when Gallant coached in Columbus, we’ll start with his three-year run in Florida. His first year in the Sunshine State was the only one where his Panthers squad posted positive xG metrics. In fact, they got slightly worse in the subsequent years he was there, while becoming an increasingly high-event squad.

We’d be remiss if we didn’t note the distinct lack of talent on the Panthers roster from 2014-17. It’s probably tougher to post positive metrics when your top offensive producer is a 43-year-old Jaromir Jagr.

At this point in their respective careers, his other core pieces like Vincent Trochek, Jonathan Huberdeau, and Aleksander Barkov were all in their very early-20’s, so this was a young group up front. In Gallant’s defense, the Panthers’ xG rate actually got worse after he was fired and Bob Boughner took over as head coach.

After two failed gigs, Gallant’s appointment to the big job for the expansion Golden Knights was a bit of a redemption tour. Right off the bat, the 57-year-old journeyman took a team full of players who had never played together, and molded them into one of the most well-oiled machines in hockey (and a Stanley Cup Final appearance in their first year of existence).

In contrast to Boudreau’s approach in Minnesota, Gallant’s Vegas team was hallmarked by sheer offensive dominance. His Golden Knights were capable of hoarding puck-possession and taking pressure off of their defense. For this reason they were mistaken as a “high-event” club, but really they didn’t concede very much on defense. A majority of their “events” took place in the offensive zone.

In the better part of three years with the Golden Knights, Gallant’s group ranked third in xGF, sixth in xGA, and first in the league in overall xG. This is nothing short of remarkable. It didn’t occur after years of implementing a system, instead the success was immediate.

Whether Gallant’s system was a perfect fit for the players acquired in the expansion draft, or if he really did a wizardly job of adapting his attack to the pieces at hand, is unknown. Either way, his accomplishments there were unprecedented.

So, why did he get fired last season? Aside from the Marc-Andre Fleury fiasco (which we will avoid diving into), Vegas was producing results that didn’t match their gaudy xG numbers. On top of allowing a higher rate of even-strength goals-against than their xGA/60 rate of 2.27 (actual GA/60 rate of 2.51), their offensive finishing prowess took a hit as well (xGF/60 of 2.88 with an actual GF/60 of 2.67).

That still shouldn’t have been enough to show him the door, but thus is the nature of the National Hockey League. Their loss will almost assuredly be another team’s gain in 2021-22.

Claude Julien

Quick Stats

Career Regular Season Record | 667-455-152 (10 ties)

Playoff Qualification Rate | 55.6-percent (10 of 18 seasons)

Average Team xGF Percentage | 52.66% (Since 2010)

Arguably the most decorated coach on this list, Julien has been an NHL head coach for nearly 20 years. Let’s begin by examining his nine-year stint with the Boston Bruins, with whom he won a Stanley Cup in 2011.

Only twice did the gold-and-black post sub-50-percent even-strength xGF percentages under Julien’s leadership. From 2010-2017, his Boston teams were best known for their defensive ability. Their seven-year average xGA/60 rate of 2.06 at five-on-five was good for sixth in the NHL in that span. Offensively, they were slightly above average, but not nearly as impressive or consistent.

I don’t mean to gloss-over what he did with the Bruins, but a good chunk of his time there was when xG analytics were either not a thing yet, or in their infancy. I don’t want to glean too much from them, though they are impressive overall.

The real story here pertains to Julien’s last season with the Bruins, and his subsequent four-year stretch with the Montreal Canadiens. What I found interesting was that Boston missed the playoffs in 2015-16 (his second-last season with the team) while posting the second-lowest even-strength xG rate of his tenure at 49.52-percent. The following year, however, their underlying marks recovered in a big way, up to over 54-percent.

It didn’t matter though. Boston missed the playoffs for the second-consecutive season, largely due to suspect goaltending (seventh-lowest save-percentage in the NHL in all situations). Either way, the Bruins brass felt it was time for a change.

What happened next is the defining detail in my admiration for Julien as a candidate for the Sabres. As soon as he took over in Montreal in 2017-18, the Canadiens started posting incredible underlying marks, particularly on offense. In the seasons leading up to his arrival, that was certainly not the case. Under Julien, Montreal averaged no fewer than 2.94 expected goals per-60 at five-on-five.

The approach here by Julien was smart, in principal. He had a conceivably strong netminder in Carey Price, so he adapted the approach he took in Boston, and tried to rely on Price to make big saves in a more medium-event system.

Unfortunately, his netminders were not up to the task. Julien’s Canadiens also carried the third-lowest shot percentage in the league. That’s a bad combination of occurrences for a team running a more wide-open system like this. This is also known as bad “PDO”, for those who aren’t aware.

Despite only making the playoffs twice and never winning a postseason series in Montreal, his approach wasn’t misguided in nature. It also showed an adaptability from what he commissioned during nearly a decade in Boston. That’s a big deal for a coach whom many felt lost his touch.

John Tortorella

Quick Stats

Career Regular Season Record | 655-515-120

Playoff Qualification Rate | 66.70-percent (12 of 18 seasons)

Average Team xGF Percentage | 51.37%

I was pretty hesitant to include Tortorella on this list. Examining the merits of prospective coaching candidates for a team that currently has a coach is enough of a reach. Prognosticating that he’ll be replaced by… another coach who is currently employed is even more presumptuous.

But, since Sabres fans seem keen on the idea and with the 62-year-old on the proverbial hot-seat in Columbus, I’ll keep this relatively brief. If you are looking for the Sabres to hire the most “adaptive” coach they can find, then Tortorella is probably someone who will intrigue you.

Now in his sixth season with the Blue Jackets, his ability to revise his approach based on the strengths of the player at his disposal is impressive. Seldom will you find a coach that leads his team to this degree of consistency in their underlying metrics. What makes this interesting isn’t the consistency itself, but rather the varying routes his Blue Jackets teams have taken to arrive there.

This isn’t a new thing for Tortorella either. He’s consistently done more with less, (save for his time with the Tampa Bay Lightning, which was an extremely talented group), but never to the degree we’ve seen over the last four years or so. The 2020-21 campaign is the first time since his one-year stint in Vancouver where Tortorella’s squad is set to post poor xG numbers.

For what feels like a decade, Sabres fans have yearned for a bench boss who can optimize and squeeze every bit out of their roster. Tortorella’s track record suggests that he fits that description quite well (though, to be fair, all of the coaches on the list do).

Closing Thoughts

To put it plainly, Buffalo can’t make a bad choice, assuming they decide to pursue one of these four candidates. Never has there been a more accomplished group of free agent coaches for the team to choose from.

No Sabres coach in history (except for Scotty Bowman) is a more decorated leader at the NHL level than these four men. Though there is a speculated reluctance from PSE to invest a substantial sum of money into the organization right now, they simply must do whatever it takes to convince one of these men to try and salvage this sinking ship.

They’d be remiss to pass up such a rare opportunity.

Photo Credit: Bruce Bennett/Getty Images

Data via: Hockeyviz.com and Evolving Hockey