I just accidentally clicked the wrong link on my Blackberry favorites and was taken to an Our Sports Central page leading with a story about the firing of Corpus Christi IceRays head coach Sylvain Cloutier.
This certainly comes as a surprise to me, so I'll be sure to read everything I can find about it and provide you with some links as soon as I get to the office.
UPDATE: Apparently everyone was just as surprised by this as I was, though I have yet to see any words from Cloutier himself about the "dismissal." Of course, IceRays GM Pat Dunn had to put a nice little quote out there explaining his and thanking Cloutier for his work:
"This is never something that's fun to do, but we felt that a change was needed," said Dunn. "This job isn't entirely about wins and losses, but we think the team isn't performing the way it's capable of and this change might be what they need. This season we made a promise to our fans that we would do everything in our power to make the IceRays a successful organization on and off the ice, and even though it's difficult, we believe this move was necessary. We appreciate Sylvain's efforts and wish him the best of luck in the future."
It seems the fans disagree, but not overwhelmingly, as this poll in the IceRays' CHL Forum is in Cloutier's favor for now (no longer the case a couple hours after I wrote that). The comments on the Caller-Times Web site are pretty mixed. Which leads to my next item...
Greg Rajan has reported that former Austin IceRays coach Brent Hughes will be the one filling Cloutier's position. I'll post a link to his final thoughts and story about all this once they're online.
Cloutier has led the IceRays to a 21-25-4 record, and they are currently one point behind the Arizona Sundogs for the last playoff spot in the Southern Conference.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Here that is.
1 comment:
Anything on Jeff Bess? What's his status?
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