The Magnificent Seven ride into New York to interview with Garth Snow

You read some of the speculation on why some coaches would be a good fit here vs those who would not be a good fit here and I kind of laugh at most of it. Unless someone who worked with these people in those places comments about what outright skills or flaws they had it's virtually worthless in terms of today or the Isles of 2008-09.

Every team and it's circumstances are different and things change a lot.

Unless we are behind the scenes working with these people on a daily basis we really have little idea of anything. Al Arbour came here in 1974 after leaving the St Louis Blues where he coached and helped build a club with prospects into a dynasty, second time when he came back for Terry Simpson it took a lot of growing pains and the club never really became a good team for a sustained period with a lot of playoff misses or mediocre clubs that only played well in stretches.

Al Arbour did not turn many prospects into star players in his second tenure as coach, however Vladimir Malakhov or Darius Kasparaitis were never better.

Of course if Arbour were looking for a job today we would be reading he can only take playoff teams to the next level and is not good for a rebuilding.

With that we present the Magnificent Seven with some background and a little speculation of our own in no particular order:

You can put the actors to the name, Gerard Gallant can play the role of Eli Wallach for this one.

1. Scott Gordon-For those who will do the Steve Stirling analogies that would be a huge mistake given age difference despite the amazing job Stirling did in the NHL as a rookie coach with an injured Isles team after a great job in Bridgeport. Scott Gordon has been an outstanding coach in the AHL with Providence as an assistant coach first who almost was named Bruins head coach last summer who is well regarded in the organization with many saying he is more than ready for an NHL head coaching job and would be a great fit as an NHL head coach. He can work well with prospects obviously but can he work well with veterans would be my question. It should be noted he was Mike Sullivan's assistant coach with Providence before before Sullivan was promoted to the Bruins coaching job.

Goaltenders generally do not have great track records as NHL head coaches (at least recently) for what that is worth but goaltenders do bond well which could be a big plus to our goaltender turned general manager.

It should be noted one of the star players on the team Scott Gordon took over in 03was current Islander Andy Hilbert who also played for Mike Sullivan and no doubt he has plenty of experience with Ben Walter.

2. Mike Sullivan-Not a lot to write here, he was promoted from Providence with little coaching experience in the AHL and was the youngest coach in the NHL at the time of his hiring guiding the Bruins to a playoff spot his first season. GM Mike O'Connell decided not to retain many veterans during the lockout that wiped out the 2004-05 season so at the end of 05-06 with the club struggling he was fired by new gm Peter Chiarelli who brought in Dave Lewis who fared no better. Sullivan was left waiting as replacements for his job were being interviewed by Boston. John Tortorella feels Sullivan is an excellent assistant as Sullivan moved on to Tampa Bay who was part of a Stanley Cup and has endorsed him many times as bein

You're currently logged into Facebook

Do you want to share your Bleacher Report activity on Facebook?