Florida Panthers head coaching choices are numerous, what about Andrew Burnette?

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William
June 18, 2022 (0:12)

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Andrew Burnette was an assistant coach with the Panthers starting in 2019-20 season. Then, when Joel Quenneville resigned in October of 2021, Burnette was elevated as interim head coach.

To all indications, he did pretty darn well. He collected an impressive 51-18-6 record and the President's Trophy for the best record in the NHL. Not many head coaches can brag about that.

Yet, for some strange reason, he has still not been named the permanent head coach of the Florida club.

In fact, he seems to have many suitors looking to replace him.

Let's examine each of these coaching candidates and their merits.

Barry Trotz seems to be on many team's priority list to fill an open spot behind the bench. He has even been tempted by a brewery in Winnipeg to have beer for life if he took the Jets coaching spot. Gotta love Barry and his 64-48 record in the postseason. His .567 points percentage is pretty awesome too.

Then, there's Rick Tocchet. While not nearly as experienced or successful as Trotz, many believe Trotz will head to Winnipeg, since he's from that area.
Tocchet has just a 178-200-60 NHL coaching record and a fairly unimpressive .475 points percentage. Is he a good fit?

Peter DeBoer was unceremoniously fired from the Vegas Golden Knights even though his 513-379-123 record with a .566 points percentage was quite stellar. He has to be hired by some team soon.

Travis Green's coaching stats show he went 133-147-34, with a .478 points percentage.

Lastly, there's Paul Maurice who added an excellent record of 775-681-99 for a .528 points percentage.

So, if you're general manager Bill Zito, who do you select as your next head coach?

For some reason, some fans of the Cats, really don't want to keep Burnette in charge.

The logical choice if you go with experience would be either Trotz or Maurice. Of course in the NHL, logic doesn't always reign. Many factors must be weighed and thus interviews are conducted.

With the long list of candidates that Zito has to choose from, he had better get going.