GREAT NHL COACHES FROM WEST QUEBEC

What’s in the water that inspires so many great NHL coaches to come out of western Quebec?

The Hull/Gatineau Olympiques of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League served as a stepping stone for the late Pat Burns, along with current NHL bosses Alain Vigneault and Claude Julien. Burns coached 1,019 career big-league games. Vigneault began the 2016-17 season with 1,052 games, and Julien was at the 942-game mark when the current season began.

Then there’s the Shawville Shuttle to the NHL. Ottawa Senators senior hockey adviser Bryan Murray coached 1,239 games in the NHL, and his brother, Terry, also a Shawville native, coached 1,012 NHL games.