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Kristen Shilton
The Philadelphia Flyers have fired coach John Tortorella as the team spiraled toward missing the playoffs for the fifth straight season and one of the worst records in the Eastern Conference.
The Flyers announced Tortorella’s dismissal Thursday and said associate coach Brad Shaw would take over as interim head coach.
“Today I made the very difficult decision to move on from John as our head coach,” Flyers general manager Daniel Briere said in a statement. “John played a vital role in our rebuild. He set a standard of play and re-established what it means to be a Philadelphia Flyer. … As we move into the next chapter of this rebuild, I felt this was the best for our team to move forward.”
Tortorella had coached the Flyers for the past three seasons, going 97-107-33 as Philadelphia was rebuilding throughout his tenure. His firing comes with Philadelphia on a six-game losing streak and having lost 11 of its past 12.
The change comes two days after the Flyers fell 7-2 to the Toronto Maple Leafs, putting Philadelphia’s record at 28-36-9, worst in the Metropolitan Division.
Shaw had joined Tortorella’s staff in July 2022 and had coached under him with the Columbus Blue Jackets. He has also served as an assistant for the New York Islanders, Vancouver Canucks and St. Louis Blues. He previously served as an interim coach for the Islanders in 2005-06, going 18-18-4.
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