Michel Therrien
Michel Therrien (* 4 November 1963 in Montreal, Quebec ) is a retired Canadian professional ice hockey defender and current coach. Since June 2012, he is head coach of the Montreal Canadiens of the National Hockey League. As a teenager, he was also active in the Canadian Baseball national team as second baseman.
- 2.1 As a player
- 2.2 As a coach
Career
Playing career
Michel Therrien grew up in Montreal on the only child of Jerry and Rachel Therrien and enthusiastic in his youth for both hockey and baseball. He played in the Canadian Baseball Junior National Team and he was a scholarship from the Palm Beach Junior College offered where he should play as a second baseman. But he opted for ice hockey.
In 1980 he was taken by the Quebec Remparts of the Quebec Major Junior League Canadian Junior Hockey League contract. He played in his three years in the league still for two more teams. With the Longueuil Chevaliers to head coach Jacques Lemaire in 1983 he was able to defeat in the playoffs the Laval Titan to Mario Lemieux, who a little later the superstar of the Pittsburgh Penguins was.
After Therrien was drafted by any NHL team, he joined in 1983 in the professional sector and was awarded a contract in the AHL second-rate at the Canadiens de Sherbrooke. With the team he had a very successful season and they won the Calder Cup in the playoffs. With the team at that time belonged, among others, the 19- year-old Patrick Roy, who should develop over the next few years to become one of the best goalkeepers of all time. It was followed by two more years for teams in the AHL and the IHL, but he had to realize that he did not had the necessary talent to create it in the NHL.
Coaching career
1989 ended Therrien his career and worked for the telecommunications company Bell Canada. In addition, he worked briefly as an assistant coach at the Titan de Laval and stood as head coach even himself for three games behind the band, but his tenure with the team was very short. In 1991 he returned to the Titans as an assistant coach Bob Hartley. Two years Therrien remained on this post until he Hartley replaced as head coach in the 1993/94 season. He continued the style of his predecessor, who preferred the physically hard game continued and succeeded. He won the championship of the LHJMQ and participated with the team at the Memorial Cup finals. In addition to many talented players and later NHL enforcer Georges Laraque as Gino Odjick and Sandy McCarthy stood in the ranks of the team.
During his time in Laval Therrien made once a stir when he beat with Alain Rajotte, coach of the Granby prédateurs during a friendly game. Therrien had set his youngest players, while Rajotte took with veterans of the game. As the young players were presented with gestures and Rajotte Therrien tried to provoke, it came to a fight. A barrier of about ten games was the result.
In 1995 he moved himself then as head coach at the Granby prédateurs. The brothers Morrissette had already possessed the Laval Titan and now when they went away from Laval and Granby prédateurs took over, they also wanted to have Therrien on board again. He led the prédateurs also in his first season to win the Memorial Cup, the main ice hockey trophy in Canada at youth level.
After another year in Granby, he was inducted into the organization of the Montreal Canadiens of the NHL in 1997. This ended his " reign " in the Junior League LHJMQ in which he won 72 percent of all games. But it started a new era for him, as he was given the post as head coach of the Fredericton Canadiens, the Montreal farm team in the AHL. After two years the team was disbanded and he worked as head coach at the new AHL farm team Québec citadels.
As the NHL team the Canadiens weakened again during the 2000/ 01 season and Alain Vigneault had to vacate his seat as a coach, Therrien took over the fortunes of the team and led it in the following year, again in the playoffs, but his tenure was already mid-season 2002 /03 over, since participation in the finals was in danger again.
In the summer of 2003 he was taken by the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins, the farm team of the Pittsburgh Penguins, under contract. Therrien was equal to his skills and led the team to the finals of the AHL playoffs for the Calder Cup. After a good 2004/05 season, the team managed in the fall of 2005, a phenomenal start to the next season with 21 wins in 25 games. For the NHL team the Penguins, however, it was not good and coach Ed Olczyk was fired and Therrien used as his successor. There he met again on Mario Lemieux, which he had already met in 1983 as an opponent in the juniors. However, Lemieux was now team owner of the Penguins, and for several months even players.
Therrien made it in the season no longer that the team could qualify for the playoffs, but he built before the 2006/07 season to the young star Sidney Crosby a competitive team together consisting of talents, such as Evgeni Malkin, Jordan Staal and Marc- consists André Fleury, but also from experienced players like Mark Recchi, Sergei Gonchar or. With them he could reach the first round of the playoffs and was nominated for the Jack Adams Award as the best coach in the NHL, once the team has improved by 47 points compared to the previous season. Only three coaches were able to help a team to a larger increase in one year in the NHL history.
In summer 2007 he was commissioned by the Pittsburgh Penguins a contract extension until 2009 and the Penguins went as one of the favorites in the 2007/ 08 season. After Pittsburgh, however, had a rather poor start to the season and in the first half of the season had to fight for the playoff places in part, the media has speculated about a possible dismissal Therriens. There were long-term injuries for providers, such as goalkeeper Fleury and the forwards Crosby and Gary Roberts. Finally, in the second half of the season, it was Evgeni Malkin and Ty Conklin substitute goalkeeper who led the team back on track and in the end the Penguins qualified for second place in the Eastern Conference safe for the playoffs. In the playoffs, the Penguins scored a walkover to the Stanley Cup finals with only two defeats in the first three rounds. Guarantor for this success were next to the young stars Crosby and Malkin and the fit-again goalkeeper Fleury and undertook in March 2008, Marián Hossa. The following season, it was not possible Therrien with the team, however, to build on these successes. After 57 games, the Penguins were only in tenth position in the Eastern Conference and five points away from a play-off place. In February 2009, Therrien was fired from his post.
After more than three years without a coaching job he was on 5 June 2012 re- engaged as coach of the Montreal Canadiens, who had finished the previous season in last place in the Eastern Conference. In the 2012/13 season Therrien led the Canadiens back into the play- offs and won with the team the division title in the Northeast Division. In the vote for the Jack Adams Award for best coach of the season, he finally was in fourth place, falling short of a nomination just barely.
Michel Therrien has been divorced since 2004 and single father of two children.