Take 5: Vegas Golden Knights officials ‘never heard a negative word about Gerard Gallant’

By Jesse Granger

Friday, April 14, 2017 | 2 a.m.

Gerard Gallant, the first coach in Vegas Golden Knights history, has the reputation of getting the most out of his players.

That, after all, is how he played the game during a 10-year National Hockey League career. Despite standing just 5-foot-10, Gallant thrived against much larger opponents at wing, and typically was one of the team’s leaders in goals and penalty minutes.

That hard-nosed mentality has carried over to his career as a coach and paved the way for Gallant to earn the label as a player-first coach, Golden Knights officials stressed Thursday during a media event to announce Gallant’s hiring.

Here’s what we learned about Gallant:

1. The coaching search was extremely thorough

When Gallant was fired by the Florida Panthers last November, he spoke with Golden Knights General Manager George McPhee about the job in Las Vegas. But McPhee didn’t hire him until five months later.

“We had a process that we wanted to go through,” McPhee said. “First of all we didn’t have any players to coach so we weren’t in a rush. We had so many things to do, so we had to get our priorities in order before we could get to the coach. Secondly, when you have time in this business you use it. Thirdly, there were some people that requested that we talk to them at the end of their seasons so we waited.”

2. Gallant is held in high regard by his former players and coaches

When Gallant was fired by the Panthers, just one year removed from leading them to the best regular-season finish in franchise history, he received an outpouring of support from his peers.

Longtime hockey announcer Don Cherry even called it, “The worst firing in the history of the world.”

“Gerard is a low ego, hardworking person with outstanding reputation of being a first-class guy,” McPhee said. “In the eight months of vetting we never heard a negative word about Gerard Gallant as a person.”

Majority owner Bill Foley shared McPhee’s sentiment, “One of the things we want to do in Las Vegas with the Golden Knights is to make sure we are embedded with the community. Gerard is a perfect guy for that and has the right type of personality for our team.”

3. Gallant will have little-to-no say in personnel moves

Between the expansion draft June 17-21 and the entry draft June 24-25, the Golden Knights’ roster will grow from one player to a full lineup. Both McPhee and Gallant made it clear during the introductory news conference that Gallant will not be choosing the players in either.

“That’s not my job,” Gallant said of evaluating players. “Kelly (McCrimmon) and George (McPhee) and the management staff will give me some players. That’s not my responsibility.”

McPhee hammered the point home, saying, “We will provide the players and Gerard will coach them. We won’t tell him how to coach and he won’t tell us how to find players.”

4. McPhee believes in the power of culture, and Gallant is the right fit for his vision

“Culture is really important and it’s not just a cliché,” McPhee said. “If there’s anything we’ve learned here already it’s that it is easier to create a culture and build a culture than to change one.

“I liked the way his team played last year. A coach has to be a lot of things and I think he embodies all of them. He has all of the things we were looking for. We know we have the right person.”

5. Gallant has experience with expansion, believes the Golden Knights will be better

Gallant was an assistant coach for the Columbus Blue Jackets for four years when they entered the league in 2000. He then took the reins as head coach from 2003-05 before he was fired. It took the Blue Jackets eight seasons to make their first playoff appearance, but Gallant already sees the potential for the Golden Knights to be successful much earlier.

“When you look at the NHL today, the difference between worst and first is not that big,” Gallant said. “We are going to get a lot of good hockey players. We will be ahead of (Columbus in 2000) because of the way the expansion draft is set up. We will have more top-end players than they had at that time.”