Mathieu Darche Has A lot of Work To Do But Little Time To Do It
The New York Islanders hired Mathieu Darche as the new general manager. There was talk of Brendan Shanahan coming in as President of Hockey Ops, but that is not happening, as Darche was named GM and Executive Vice President. With no one looking over his shoulder outside of COO John Collins, it is Darche’s show on the Island. However, he has a lot of work to do in a very short time to do it.
Andrew Gross of Newsday joined Mike Kelly and EJ Hradek on NHL Network‘s First Shift to discuss the hiring of Mathieu Darcheas the new general manager of the New York Islanders. Gross was asked about how Darche will round out his staff and the roster moving forward.
NHLRumors.com Transcriptions
NHL Rumors: New York Islanders Have Three Questions To Answer
Mike Kelly: “So, as Mathieu Darche does take over as general manager. However, that shapes out to be exactly for people that aren’t following the New York Islanders day to day, per se, what are some of the business that he’s going to have to take care of as we enter the off-season here?”
Andrew Gross: “Yeah, I mean, it’s going to come very fast and furious for him, like I mentioned, Patrick Roy, he’s under contract. Mathieu Darche, I think, he has to feel like this is his guy, too. They have to establish a rapport, and that’s going to be through discussions. And then Mathieu has to basically bring in, I would assume he’s going to bring in, eventually, his own management staff. But with the draft coming up just about a month out in Los Angeles, although Mathieu will be conducting that from Long Island, you got to get your board correct. You got to be on board with the scouts.
And the Islanders have the number one pick here. There are a lot of options there, even though Matthew Schaefer seems to be sort of the consensus number one pick. If the Islanders aren’t sold on Schaefer and the Sharks are, maybe you swap one for two, and you get additional assets. But that’s tangentially. You got the scouting combine coming up. That’s in about a week? You got the first buyout period coming right after the Stanley Cup Final ends.
NHL Rumors: New York Islanders Must Get GM Hire Right
And you got decisions on guys like defenseman Scott Mayfield, who wound up being a healthy scratch more often than Scott would have liked down the stretch. Pierre Engvall, who was a good contributor down the stretch, but this is a team that didn’t make the playoffs. And Scottty and Pierre Engvall are both just two years into seven-year deals. So are there buyouts there?
There are ton of questions for Mathieu Darche, who’s going to very have to quickly kind of stamp this as his own team.”
NHLRumors.com Note: The New York Islanders had issues between Head Coach Patrick Roy and former GM Lou Lamoriello. Roy made subtle comments about the roster and the players on it. Given that it is most likely Roy is coming back as head coach, he will have discussions with Darche about the type of players he wants on the roster. Again, he will not cave into everything Roy wants because he has his own vision of the team. However, the GM and coach have to be on the same page regarding the players on the team.
NHL Rumors: Could Patrick Roy’s Days as the New York Islanders Head Coach be Numbered?
It will be interesting to see what Darche decides to do with Kyle Palmieri and Adam Boqvist. Both players had verbal deals about extensions with the Islanders before Lamoriello’s contract was not renewed. In addition, Noah Dobson and Alexander Romanov need extensions. However, outside of that, the Islanders have a lot of cap space to work with to fill out the roster.
The New York Islanders want to be contenders again. It is just a matter of how long it will take.
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