Patrick Williams, TheAHL.com Features Writer
Life in Montreal. It’s intense for a member of the Montreal Canadiens. Some of that same passion extends to their AHL affiliate, the Laval Rocket. Playing out of nearby Place Bell, Rocket players must deal with considerable scrutiny as well. It’s a special, if fervent, experience. A two-part series will examine the experience from both the playing and coaching perspective. Part 1 can be found here.
Pascal Vincent understood the job before he had even taken it.
Named head coach of the Laval Rocket head coach July 16, 2024, Vincent met all of the post’s requirements at the rink and away from it.
NHL experience? Yes. He led the Columbus Blue Jackets as a head coach after putting in seven seasons in coaching roles with both that organization and the Winnipeg Jets.
Familiarity with the AHL and the particulars that come with this league? Absolutely. He helmed the Manitoba Moose for five seasons, earning the Louis A.R. Pieri Memorial Award as the league’s outstanding coach in his first campaign.
Knowing what he was getting into by coming to the Montreal Canadiens organization? Certainly. He grew up in Laval, a city separated from Montreal by just a river and very much a part of the metropolitan area. Bilingual and well-spoken, he could handle all of the public-facing and media responsibilities that come with working in the Montreal market. He had even worked in Montreal as a head coach. He spent three seasons as a general manager and head coach with the Montreal Junior of the now-Quebec Maritimes Junior Hockey League. In fact, his start in coaching, way back in 1994, came when he took a QMJHL assistant-coaching role as a 21-year-old with Saint Jean, just a short drive from Montreal.
Vincent has succeeded on two fronts with the Rocket so far. He develops talent. Detailed and precise, his players will show up at Bell Centre prepared if and when that NHL recall comes.
And he wins. Last season he led them to the AHL’s best regular-season record, going 48-19-3-2. That was .701 hockey, the second-best points percentage by a Habs affiliate in AHL history. The Rocket went on to take two playoff rounds and reach the Eastern Conference Finals. Add another Pieri Memorial Award to his resume. He has another winning team this season with the Rocket atop the North Division. He will lead the North Division at the AHL All-Star Classic presented by BMO next week.
Vincent had worked 10 seasons at the NHL and AHL levels in Winnipeg, where hockey dominates. Columbus came with the scrutiny that any NHL city brings with it. But this is the Montreal market. The Habs. And the Habs’ future, particularly in a period in which president Jeff Gorton and general manager Kent Hughes came to town and made improving player development a top organizational priority.
Such is life guiding Canadiens prospects, many of them barely into their twenties and with only a year or two of professional experience, if that. He has sent players on to the Habs to fill in as needed. Samuel Blais, Owen Beck, Jared Davidson, Adam Engström, Jacob Fowler, Joshua Roy and Florian Xhekaj all have played games with the Canadiens this season.
Part of playing for the Rocket is understanding the organization’s rich history at both the NHL and AHL levels. Photographs and artwork line the hallways in and around the Laval dressing room at Place Bell. The iconic photo of Maurice “Rocket” Richard, the team’s namesake, and Boston Bruins goaltender Jim Henry shaking hands took early residence on the facility’s walls. But it’s not just Canadiens history. Laval’s AHL predecessors have been given attention and focus on those same walls.
And the Rocket, the team that Vincent stewards each day, had a rich history long before they ever came to Laval.
The Canadiens organization had cycled through several stops and nearly a half-century since the last time that it had its AHL affiliate so nearby. The Montreal Voyageurs – a team briefly headlined by the late Ken Dryden – set up operations at the Montreal Forum in 1969. But the team pulled out after two seasons and headed to Halifax, giving the AHL its first presence in Atlantic Canada. There, the Nova Scotia Voyageurs became one of the AHL’s 1970s powerhouses, winning the Calder Cup three times, helping to fuel what would become the late-70s Canadiens dynasty that captured four consecutive Stanley Cup titles, and setting up the AHL for future growth in the Maritimes. The likes of Guy Carbonneau, Larry Robinson, Yvon Lambert and Gilles Lupien all ranked among the players who apprenticed with the Vees and then graduated to Stanley Cup glory in Montreal.
From Halifax it was on to Sherbrooke, where late-season additions Patrick Roy and Stéphane Richer helped the team to win the 1985 Calder Cup in its first season. When Montreal pulled its AHL affiliate out of Sherbrooke in 1990, it began a lengthy odyssey that stretched more than two more decades. The Fredericton Canadiens, Quebec Citadelles, Hamilton Bulldogs and St. John’s IceCaps all offered their share of advantages, successes and memories through the years. Carey Price led Hamilton to the Calder Cup as a rookie in 2007 in his final step before going on to Habs greatness.
But finally the Habs decided to bring their prospects home.
Place Bell, a 10,000-plus-seat arena with amenities to match an NHL facility, went from idea to drawing board to shovels in the ground. With a brand-new building on the way, the Habs opted to relocate the IceCaps to Laval for the 2017-18 season.
However, a pair of last-place North Division finishes and pandemic-related disruption meant that the new club went nearly five years before playing its first playoff game. But that wait paid off when the franchise truly found its presence in 2022 with a solid, but mostly unheralded Laval club that had finished third in the North Division. That team got hot once the Calder Cup Playoffs arrived. Then they got hotter and hotter and went all the way to Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals, knocking off the Syracuse Crunch and Rochester Americans before finally falling to the Springfield Thunderbirds. With the Canadiens struggling and interest turning to what the club might have in the way of young talent, night after night that spring saw Rocket fans filling Place Bell.
After two seasons at or near the bottom of the North Division, though, Canadiens management brought in Vincent as their Laval new head coach. It was the next step in the ever-increasing changes that had taken hold in and around the Canadiens since the management team of Gorton and Hughes had arrived midway through the 2021-22 season to begin a major revamping of the organization on – and perhaps just as importantly – off the ice.
Vincent came as a big-time hire befitting a premier Original Six organization trying to assemble a blue-chip AHL operation. The Canadiens wanted a teacher like Vincent and kept filling up the Laval roster with young talent, too.
But Vincent also had another quality, one that works quite well in a market with passionate fans, intense media coverage, and constant focus. He is soft-spoken. Calm. Even. Not rattled. Ultra-quick to credit others throughout the Montreal organization for Laval’s success.
Those qualities provide a soothing contrast amid all of that noise and the potential distractions that exist for a hockey player in the Montreal – and Laval — markets. Even with so much of that noise, Vincent’s message and teaching has connected quickly with his new players. That may well be even more crucial given the team’s success since his arrival.
“Last year,” Vincent said, “I don’t think there were a lot of expectations, and this team surprised a lot of people. I think this year, teams are waiting for us. So, there’s a lot of resilience.”
Montreal management has made sure to put a strong leadership group with Laval with a clear mandate: be another source of help for developing prospects. But keeping that plan in place and adhering to it each day is part of Vincent’s day-to-day job description. It can be easy for any player or coach alike to stray a bit from that development perspective.
“[The players] understand the mission,” said the head coach whose job is to reinforce that understanding. “They understand what we’re doing. They understand that we’re here to create a winning environment and win as many games as possible, but it’s going to be about developing, and that’s what they understand and they’re part of it. Our kids are developing really well.”
This weekend will test those skills again. The Cleveland Monsters are in town for a pair of key North Division games Friday and Saturday. The teams went head-to-head last year in the North Division Semifinals. The Monsters are their typical hard-nosed, diligent selves and on a 6-0-1-0 run. Perhaps another Calder Cup Playoff match-up is ahead once spring arrives. As usual, tickets for both games are limited. With the Canadiens starting the NHL’s Winter Olympic break, the Rocket will have the entire market’s attention to themselves.
This weekend will be intense. Vincent’s job, as always, will be to lead his players through all of that noise.