Bruce Cassidy vs. Panthers Final turns heat up on Jim Montgomery, Bruins

The end of this Stanley Cup Final can’t come soon enough for the Bruins and especially Jim Montgomery.

Every day that the sport’s spotlight is focused on the Bruins’ former coach facing the team that stunned Boston in the first round of the playoffs is a blaring foghorn reminding all of hockey of what the Bruins aren’t doing right now.

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The optics are worse than the reality.

Bruce Cassidy’s success in Vegas doesn’t mean the Bruins shouldn’t have fired him. Cassidy had a bad run in Washington learned from it and was better, much better in fact, in Boston.

But coaches are like pitchers. Some have enough in their repertoire to be great multiple times through an opposing batting order. Others lose their effectiveness the second and third time through. Cassidy is unquestionably a good coach but his methods seemed to have stopped reaching the core of this Boston group, or enough of it anyway by year six. Cassidy didn’t deserve to be fired, but it wasn’t the wrong move for the Bruins either.

Florida’s continued postseason success can be interpreted in two opposite ways. The Bruins’ loss wasn’t as bad as it initially looked because the Panthers clearly weren’t some typical No. 8 seed. They weren’t the 2019 Blue Jackets, who stunned a regular-season dominant Lightning team before falling to the Bruins in the second round.

On the other hand, the Bruins were seconds away from beating the Panthers. Had they sidestepped that blow, it’s not a difficult leap of faith to think that Boston would have advanced to the final if they had. That what-if is a killer.

The historic regular season success proved detrimental to the playoff Bruins. Not because of some Presidents’ Trophy curse, but because the adversity Boston faced in the playoffs was largely new. They never had to win a game until it was too late.

Montgomery made mistakes and certainly didn’t adjust effectively in the postseason. He relied too much on players, who were battling injury and over-shuffled his lineup. But it was a microcosm in a unique moment. Every other coach in the NHL had a chance to work through adversity during the or play a big game with seeding implications. Montgomery and the Bruins never did.

Montgomery will deservedly be under more scrutiny in 2023-24, but the same way the Bruins’ outstanding regular season doesn’t prove he’s a great coach, their skid in the first round shouldn’t be damning evidence that he’s not.

The Bruins won’t be as good during the regular season next year. Even if Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci don’t retire, there’s no way to bring everyone back under the salary cap so they won’t be as deep or as talented. Jim Montgomery’s coaching skills will be tested against much more regular circumstances.

But the stakes for success and failure will be higher. Fans watched what Cassidy did and what the Panthers did and they’ll want more.