Nashville GM has chance at Stanley Cup after 35 years
Nashville Predators general manager David Poile will watch his team compete in the Stanley Cup Final against the Pittsburgh Penguins beginning in Pittsburgh on Monday.
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — David Poile thought he could squeeze in a quick day off after the exhilarating run by the Nashville Predators to their first Stanley Cup Final. Wrong. At least 200 texts and emails congratulating him on the Western Conference title greeted him. Then Predators’ only general manager had to deal with logistics, tickets, hotel rooms and talk with league officials to prepare them for the Stanley Cup Final starting Monday night in Pittsburgh.
It’s Poile’s first Stanley Cup Final after 15 years as general manager of the Washington Capitals and nearly 20 years of building the Predators from scratch as an expansion franchise.
“After all these years I’m doing something I’ve never done before, and it’s different and it’s a challenge,” Poile said with a big smile. “But I’m ready for it.”
No general manager has been with his current team longer than Poile, whose father, Bud, won the Stanley Cup playing for Toronto in 1947 and is in the Hockey Hall of Fame. Next season, Poile will pass Jack Adams and Glen Sather as the NHL’s longest serving general manager, and only Sather has more games and wins (2,700 and 1,319) than Poile File, Mark Humphrey / The Associated Press (2,622 and 1,280). Poile also was general manager of the U.S. Olympic team in 2014. But he never made it to Sochi after being struck by a puck in the right eye at a Predators’ morning skate, breaking his nose and costing him his vision.
Now, all across hockey, people are rooting for Poile to finally win a championship.
“The hockey community in general is elated for him,” said Brian Burke, president of hockey operations for the Calgary Flames. “He has performed at such a high level for so long in this league and not been rewarded like this. He’s got lots of people pulling for him to go all the way.”
Hockey history will be made for American coaches in the Stanley Cup Final.
The Cup has been handed out 89 times to the champion of the NHL since 1927. For the first time, two American coaches will face off in the final when the Nashville Predators’ Peter Laviolette goes up against the Pittsburgh Penguins’ Mike Sullivan.
It’s just the seventh time the Cup will be won by a U.S.-born coach.
“Having two American coaches lead their team in the Stanley Cup Final highlights the continued growth and evolution of the sport in our country,” USA Hockey executive director Dave Ogrean said. “We have more coaches in our country than ever before, and two of our very best are in the final.”
Laviolette and Sullivan are among six U.S.-born current coaches in the NHL, along with the Blue Jackets’ John Tortorella, Red Wings’ Jeff Blashill, Devils’ John Hynes and Islanders’ Doug Weight.