Bruce Cassidy was fired by the Vegas Golden Knights on Sunday.
The canning comes after the Golden Knights lost to the Washington Capitals 5-4 on Saturday. After the Capitals took a 3-0 lead, Vegas scored four consecutive goals, only to give up the game-tying marker to Dylan Strome and lose in the shootout. Notably, Logan Thompson, a former goaltender under Cassidy that Vegas opted to trade away, collected the win.
The Golden Knights have hired John Tortorella to lead the team for the rest of the season. The fiery and controversial head coach recently served as an assistant for Team USA’s gold-medal-winning club at the Olympics. He has coached 1,620 NHL games (sixth-most all-time) and has 770 wins (ninth-most all-time), winning the Stanley Cup once in 2004 with the Tampa Bay Lightning.
“We thank Bruce Cassidy for his dedication to our hockey club and community over the past four seasons,” Golden Knights Kelly McCrimmon said in a statement. “Under Bruce’s leadership, we reached our ultimate goal in 2023 by bringing a Stanley Cup to Vegas. Bruce will forever be remembered with the utmost regard by our organization for what was accomplished here. With the stretch run of the 2025-26 regular season upon us, we believe that a change is necessary for us to return to the level of play that is expected of our club. With John Tortorella, we bring in a Stanley Cup Champion as well as one of the most experienced and respected coaches in the NHL. His guidance will be a great asset to our team at the pivotal point in the season we currently face. We look forward to welcoming John to Vegas.”
The firing after the loss to the Capitals is the second indignity Cassidy has faced related to the DC hockey franchise. Cassidy was also canned by the Capitals just 110 regular-season games into his NHL head coaching career.
After leading the team to a respectable 39-29-8-6 record in his first season as Caps head coach (2002-03), he lasted just 28 games into the 2003-04 season, posting an 8-16-1-1 record. He lost the team after reportedly bringing up players’ personal lives in the locker room.
Cassidy ends his Vegas tenure with a 178-99-43 record over four seasons (2022–2026) with the Golden Knights. He led the team to its first Stanley Cup championship in 2023 and recorded two 50-win seasons. This season, Vegas has struggled mightily to find its top form, posting a record of 32-26-16 (80 standings points).
The team currently sits in third place in the NHL’s worst division, just three points ahead of the Nashville Predators who occupy the final playoff spot in the Western Conference.
