Alex Rickman

January 30th, 2022

On January 22nd, Bruce Boudreau was officially dismissed as head coach of the Vancouver Canucks. It’s hard to say this is a surprising move, as it’s seemed clear that Bruce was on his way out for weeks if not months now, but it’s still a sad sight to see him go. It’s been clear for a while now that Boudreau and the Canucks front office don’t see eye to eye on a variety of things, and that the front office was less than pleased that Boudreau was in place as a head coach rather than someone of their choosing, so sooner or later something was going to have to give. However, these differences in philosophy do not at all excuse the disrespect that the Canucks brass have shown Boudreau over the last few months, and some questions have to be asked about what exactly the front office thought gave them the right to treat their head coach so poorly. Let’s have a look into what exactly has gone on with the Bruce Boudreau situation and where it all went wrong for the Canucks.

After an abysmal start to the 2021-22 season under Travis Green, he, along with general manager Jim Benning, were let go. Bruce Boudreau stepped in as the Canucks head coach on December 5th, 2021. What followed would be one of the most fun runs of Canucks hockey we’ve seen in years, with a 9-game point streak following Bruce’s hire dragging the team kicking and screaming back into playoff contention. While the team would ultimately fall short of the postseason, it felt like something special was forming, and that chants of “Bruce there it is” would be heard at a Canucks postseason game very soon. How we all wish we lived in that timeline. 

There was talk of some friction between Boudreau and the front office that came up during the later parts of last season, but the offseason gave us our first look into the unfathomable possibility of Boudreau not returning for a second season as Canucks bench boss. Rumours swirled that, despite the team's results under Boudreau, Patrik Allvin and Jim Rutherford wished to bring a more structured coach to Vancouver and would be happy to let Boudreau walk. In the end, Boudreau did return to coach this season, but it was clear that his job was far from secure, and any slip-ups could lead to him being given his marching orders.

There was certainly some optimism around the Canucks going into this season, but that quickly faded away after a 7-game losing streak to start the season that the team never seemed to recover from. Many things were to blame for this team's poor performance, from surprise struggles from Thatcher Demko to a lack of improvement on the blue line in the offseason, but the consensus among the fanbase was that Boudreau had been dealt a poor hand and wasn’t to blame. The front office and ownership disagreed. Despite the poor roster he’d been handed and the apparent lack of willingness to cut some of the dead weight, Boudreau had sinned being unable to make wine from the sewage water he’d been given. From there, it became clear that Boudreau’s days in Vancouver were numbered, and it was just a question of when he’d lose his job. 

Ultimately, the 4-2 loss to the Oilers on January 21st would prove to be Boudreau’s final as a Canuck, but to the shock of many, Rogers Arena wasn’t in the somber mood it’s spent most of its time in lately. Instead, knowing this would be his last game, Canucks fans decided that our beloved coach needed a proper sendoff, as “Bruce there it is” rained down one final time after the final whistle blew. A teary-eyed Boudreau stayed on the bench for a few seconds, taking in the moment and saluting the fans, before stepping down the tunnel one last time. While we’ll never know for sure what the scene in the locker room was like after the game, from what we’ve heard it wasn’t just Boudreau but his players as well getting emotional saying goodbye.

So what exactly can how Bruce Boudreau was unceremoniously disposed of by the Canucks tell us about this organization and its future? For starters, the horrible manner in which Boudreau’s firing was handled along with Rachel Doerrie’s surprise exit before the start of the season prompted questions about the organizational culture Rutherford and Co. have created. Doerrie since being fired has filed a human rights complaint, saying she was discriminated against by assistant general manager Emilie Castonguay. The inner workings of the organization will never be 100% clear to the general public, but from the small glimpse we get the workplace environment created by the executives doesn’t seem especially healthy.

Focusing on Boudreau’s case specifically, it’s nearly unheard of for a coach to have his name dragged through the mud for so long by an organization he’s still employed by. For months now Jim Rutherford has taken nearly every opportunity he’s had in interviews to belittle Boudreau’s achievements and throw him under the bus for what’s gone wrong, albeit mostly through passive-aggression rather than directly. Complaints about the team's structure and reliance on Demko have been a staple of the Canucks President’s interviews over the past year, and while Rutherford has the right to have these concerns with Boudreau, airing his complaints out and deflecting the blame off of the front office and ownership is an incredibly low level to stoop to. When you also consider that Rutherford is one of the league's most experienced and well-respected executives, it comes into question what made him think he had the right to show so much disrespect to a beloved coach like Boudreau in such a public forum. 

In addition to what this organization has already done to people like Boudreau and Doerrie, the situation that they’re now asking new coach Rick Tocchet to walk into isn’t at all fair to Tocchet. Rick Tocchet has done nothing wrong here, but because of who he’s set to replace and the circumstances in which he’s replacing him, there will be fans holding a lot of resentment toward him before he’s even coached a game in Vancouver. We’re not sure what Tocchet will be able to do as Canucks bench boss, but the environment Tocchet has walked into is hostile, to say the least. 

As painful as Boudreau being gone is, this is just a symptom of a bigger issue. During Francesco Aquilini’s time as Canucks owner, upper management has been entirely unable to take accountability for anything that has gone wrong with the team, and until that changes the team will be trapped somewhere between mediocrity and the bottom of the league. While there have been problematic players and coaches during this period, decisions coming from the top have been the downfall of this team, from the contracts Jim Benning was permitted to hand out to the all-out refusal of Aquilini to blow up a fledgling roster and rebuild for the future.  If you take any issues the Canucks have had over the last decade and trace them back to their root, you’ll find a common source for all of their problems; Francesco Aquilini. 

We can’t bring Boudreau back, but now that his time in Vancouver is up, all Canucks fans owe Bruce a debt of gratitude. Apart from potentially the bubble run in 2020, Bruce’s first year in Vancouver was the only time being a Canucks fan was a fun experience during the last 5 years. Incompetent management has made cheering for this team pretty miserable since the collapse of the 2011 era team, but Boudreau, if only briefly, managed to put smiles back on the faces of Canucks fans, and give us hope for a future where we can be proud of the team we love. Now, unfortunately, those dreams of a better future have, much like our beloved coach, been banished by Aquilini and Rutherford’s failure to take accountability for their mistakes.

Bruce, there it is.