Peter Laviolette, Patrick Roy among Leafs coach candidates?

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Another potential coaching candidate for the Maple Leafs came off the board this week when the Vancouver Canucks named Manny Malhotra as their new coach.

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The speculation pendulum has now swung toward greater National Hockey League experience, as the Leafs are said to have talked to Peter Laviolette, as reported by Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman on his 32 Thoughts podcast on Wednesday, and Patrick Roy.

Wednesday marked three weeks since the Leafs announced the firing of coach Craig Berube, and as general manager John Chayka that day stressed it would be, the search for a replacement has been thorough and wide.

Laviolette, 61, has 846 NHL coaching wins, the seventh-most in league history, and sits ninth in games coached with 1,594. Laviolette didn’t coach in 2025-26 after the New York Rangers fired him in April 2025 following two seasons as the Blueshirts’ coach.

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As the coach of six NHL teams, Laviolette’s span with one team has ranged from two years with the New York Islanders (2001-03) to six with the Nashville Predators (2014-20).

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The 60-year-old Roy was fired by the Islanders in early April, as New York felt it was crucial to beat other NHL teams to the punch to hire Peter DeBoer, who would have been at the top of every coaching list had he still been unemployed into the off-season.

Roy didn’t have success in three years as coach of the Colorado Avalanche, losing in the first round in 2014 and missing the playoffs in each of the next two years, but he beefed up his resume with a Quebec Major Junior Hockey League title in 2023 as coach of the Quebec Remparts.

How would Roy fit in Toronto?

Roy’s matter-of-fact, emotional approach would fit in nicely in Toronto, never mind the Hall of Famer’s connection to the Leafs’ bitter rival, the Montreal Canadiens.

There reportedly was initial Leafs interest in David Carle, who has won three NCAA titles in the past five years with the University of Denver. The 36-year-old Carle’s resume also includes a couple of gold medals with the United States at the world junior championship, but Carle has never so much as stepped behind an NHL bench.

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Considering Chayka hasn’t made vast NHL experience absolute criteria to be the next Leafs coach, we wonder if he would cast an eye toward Jussi Ahokas, whose first three sharp years as coach of the Kitchener Rangers culminated in a Memorial Cup title this past Sunday in Kelowna, B.C.

The Rangers ran the table in the tournament, winning all four of their games while outscoring their opponents 20-6. The 45-year-old Ahokas built an extensive coaching foundation in his native Finland before Kitchener hired him in 2023.

As for Malhotra, in reality, it seemed he was destined to be the next Canucks coach after Adam Foote was fired two weeks ago. With the Leafs as an assistant coach from 2020-24, Malhotra would have stepped in with a team in Toronto that he knew well and not needed much runway.

Malhotra further proved his worth as coach of the Canucks’ American Hockey League affiliate in Abbotsford, B.C., guiding the farm-team Canucks to a Calder Cup title last year.

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No Leafs coaching announcement appears to be imminent, as Chayka is slated to meet with media on Friday afternoon at the NHL scouting combine in Buffalo, along with Leafs amateur scouting director Mark Leach.

What seems to be the case is that the Leafs think no matter who they hire, whether it’s someone who has no NHL experience or hundreds of games behind an NHL bench, they won’t be far off from returning to Stanley Cup playoff contention.

Leafs relinquish rights to pair

A couple of recent Leafs draft picks are no longer tethered to the club and will be eligible for the 2026 draft.

Kitchener forward Matthew Hlacar, the Leafs’ seventh-round pick last year, did not receive a bona fide offer prior to the June 1 deadline. Hlacar had 12 points and 91 penalty minutes this past season and had one goal in 15 playoff games, but he did not dress for the Rangers in any of their four games at the Memorial Cup.

Spokane Chiefs defenceman Nathan Mayes, a seventh-round pick in 2024, was not signed before the June 1 deadline. Mayes had 16 points and 74 penalty minutes in 63 games this past season, his third full year in the Western Hockey League.

tkoshan@postmedia.com

X: @koshtorontosun

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