John Tortorella isn’t ready to walk away from the bench. The 68-year-old NHL veteran is making it clear he wants another shot at being a head coach, speaking publicly for the first time since the Vegas Golden Knights announced they were moving on without him.
Tortorella sat down with The Athletic to share his thoughts after Vegas decided not to retain him, despite the fact that he guided the team all the way to the Stanley Cup Final this past spring.
“Oh, I want to coach,” Tortorella told The Athletic. “I want to coach now. I’m not sure if that happens, and that’s where I am in my career. But I wanted to coach that Vegas team. I told (general manager Kelly McCrimmon) that.”
Instead of bringing Tortorella back, the Golden Knights elevated Ryan Craig — previously the head coach of the American Hockey League’s Henderson Silver Knights — to lead the NHL club.
“I guess the word I’d use is ‘Disappointed,’” Tortorella said. “I was honest with Kelly. We met the next morning (after the Carolina Hurricanes dispatched the Golden Knights in six games during the Stanley Cup Final). … Kelly is very honest, and he let me know within one minute of sitting down in that meeting — he basically told me, ‘Ryan Craig is coaching the team next year.’ I told him what I thought, and we had an honest conversation. I truly respect where the organization is going.
“We didn’t finish the job, and I wanted some more time with that club to try to finish the job. That’s not my call. That’s the general manager and president’s call. You just get about your business after that.”
Because all current NHL coaching openings have already been filled, Tortorella will need to sit tight until another position becomes available.
His time with Vegas began on March 29, when he was brought in after the team abruptly let go of head coach Bruce Cassidy with just eight games left in the regular season. Tortorella’s impact was immediate — the Golden Knights went 7-0-1 the rest of the way to claim the Pacific Division title.
That strong finish carried into the playoffs, where Vegas defeated both the Utah Mammoth and the Ducks in six games in the first two rounds before sweeping the Colorado Avalanche in the Western Conference final.
Tortorella also addressed a controversy from the playoffs — his decision to skip the mandatory postgame media availability after Vegas eliminated the Anaheim Ducks in the second round. That choice cost him personally, as the NHL handed him a $100,000 fine, and the team lost a second-round draft pick as a result. Even so, Tortorella said he has zero regrets.
“That wasn’t me not wanting to do the press,” Tortorella explained. “That was me not wanting to hold up my team. I had to make a decision. … I was not going to hold up my hockey team after eliminating a team from the playoffs. I had to make a decision: to wait for (Ducks head coach Joel Quenneville) to finish and talk to you guys and hold up my hockey team, or go on the bus with my hockey team. I’m going with my hockey team. I own that. There was no underlying (issue). It was just bad timing.”
Tortorella’s career win total of 777 ranks ninth all-time in NHL history. His complete record as a head coach stands at 777-648-166 with 37 ties. The highlight of his career came when he led the Tampa Bay Lightning to a Stanley Cup championship in 2003-04. He is also a two-time winner of the Jack Adams Award, given annually to the league’s top coach. Over the course of his career, he has also helmed the New York Rangers, Vancouver Canucks, Columbus Blue Jackets, and Philadelphia Flyers.
