Chicago Blackhawks Roster Rumors: Coach Joel Quenneville Gets Three-Year Extension
Joel Quenneville will have a chance to add to this three Stanley Cup titles with the news that the Chicago Blackhawks have extended his contract to three years. The announcement was made by the team on Tuesday.
The Blackhawks capped off an impressive win against the Nashville Predators on the same day by extending their head coach's stay. The win gave Chicago its eight-straight victory in the NHL regular season. Well, this current streak is actually the longest in the league this season.
Quenneville talked about the victory right after the game. "It's been a special place here in Chicago for us. We've had a lot of success. Great group… it's been eight great years," he said.
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With the win, the Blackhawks are now in second place in the Central Division, where they are only trailing by two points to the division-leading Dallas Stars. If all goes well this year, and the team avoids major injuries to its regular rotation, then Quenneville is on track to getting a second straight championship for this franchise.
The 57-year-old coach took over as coach early in the 2008-2009 season, replacing Denis Savard. Savard, a Hall of Famer himself, was questionably sacked by then general manager Dale Tallon. Although Savard's exit was met with criticism at that point, no one really thought that Quenneville would propel the team to better success in the coming years.
Aside from inspiring success in Chicago, the coach also trained and molded future league stars in Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane. When he started coaching the Blackhawks, Toews was just 20 at that time, while Kane was a young and untested 19-year-old. Fast-forward to today, both players lead the same team with the same coach, along with a new bunch of prospects and young players.
In almost 20 years of coaching in the NHL, Quenneville compiled a record of 782-451-77-110, with eight of those years in Chicago.
