It’s midday Tuesday at Rogers Arena in Vancouver, and Alain Vigneault, very much in control, is directing the New York Rangers’ practice ahead of a Wednesday game against the Canucks.

It was here four years ago in mid-June, with Vigneault then behind the Vancouver bench, that the Canucks came within one win of the Stanley Cup.

Two years ago, Vigneault helped lead the Rangers to the Cup finals, but lost again.

Last season, Vigneault guided the team to the league’s best regular-season record and in the playoffs the Rangers fell one game short of another Cup final.

Without much popular acclaim, Vigneault has enjoyed great success in his NHL career. On Wednesday night, the 54-year-old will coach his 999th regular-season National Hockey League game; No. 1,000 will be in Edmonton on Friday. Only 23 others have stood behind the bench for 1,000 or more NHL games, and with 538 wins going into the Canucks game, Vigneault has a solid winning record.

However, it was 15 years ago, early in the 2000-01 season, when Vigneault was fired from his first NHL head-coaching job, with the Montreal Canadiens, an incredible gig for a Quebec City native in his late-30s who’d been a fringe NHL defenceman and then made a name coaching major junior in Quebec and then as an Ottawa Senators’ assistant.

The firing came just months after Vigneault had been a finalist for coach of the year. He sent out a pile of résumés. Nothing. His marriage suffered. He had two young daughters.

“I couldn’t find a job,” he said Tuesday. “A lot of bills.”

He eventually took a big step back and returned to junior. Getting back to the NHL looked like a trip to the moon. “I was just trying to work and pay my bills,” he said. “I was fortunate to do a job that I liked.”


Junior led to a season in the American Hockey League in charge of Vancouver’s affiliate – and then Vigneault was back in the NHL in 2006-07. The Canucks made the playoffs his first season and in the second, beset by injuries, they missed. Vigneault figured he was done for, but general manager Dave Nonis was fired instead. “Dave paid the note,” said Vigneault.

The coach’s hold remained tenuous. In 2008-09, there was a span of games, from just before Christmas through the end of January, when Vancouver couldn’t win at home and plummeted from a prime playoff position to out of contention. The Canucks owners wanted him gone. New general manager Mike Gillis parried the pressure.

“He never buckled,” said Vigneault of Gillis. “He didn’t know me from anything and he was right by my side.”

In 2010-11, the Canucks went on a run that eventually extended all the way to game seven the Stanley Cup final.

Vigneault was fired in Vancuver in 2013, after the Canucks suffered a second consecutive first-round playoff loss. The fiery John Tortorella, at the same time, lost his job in New York, leading to an odd job swap. For a while, the Rangers and Canucks, with their new coaches, were equals, but Vancouver faltered and New York surged.

On Tuesday, Henrik Lundqvist remembered the first months of Vigneault’s tenure in New York. On New Year’s Day, the season three months old, the Rangers were still outside the playoff picture. “His patience,” said New York’s star goaltender. “We were struggling but he kept his cool.” Vigneault preached “the process,” as he has for years. It’s a stoicism burned into him. The faith in the players was buoying, said Lundqvist. “That’s a good feeling.”

For Vigneault, it’s a third life. But imagining a Vigneault tenure here that somehow lasted doesn’t make sense. Even Scotty Bowman got fired. In the NHL, since the start of last season, half of all coaches are new to their current jobs. Half.

No coach can last forever in the same job. “It’s tough to be in that position for that long,” said Dan Boyle, the Rangers defenceman who previously had vied against Vigneault’s Canucks as a San Jose Shark At the same time, Vigneault is one of 13 current veteran NHL coaches, nearly half the league, but many, like Babcock, are fresh in their gigs. The 13 have all coached roughly 900 games or more. Alongside Vigneault, there are three more – Babcock in Toronto, Tortorella in Columbus and Arizona’s Dave Tippett – who are set to reach the 1,000-game mark this season.

One thing grates. Hockey Canada has never called. Two Cup finals – almost three – in five years. A four-time finalist for coach of the year. No calls. Like when he was out of work. “I haven’t been asked,” said Vigneault, “so I really don’t have anything to say.” His measured tone said what he needed to say.

Asked of advice to his younger self, the NHL assistant in his early 30s in Ottawa, Vigneault was frank. The time required to succeed is gigantic. Family pays. Work-life is not in balance. “You sacrifice a lot of things, on a personal level,” he said. “Once hockey season starts, basically all we do is work in hockey. The balance that people have in life, between their family lives and their work, is really tested and put the limit.”

He is willing to pay. “I’ve never felt I worked a day in my life,” he said. “I love the game. I was willing to make that sacrifice.”