Jacques Martin

Jacques Martin (born October 1, 1952 in St. Pascal, Ontario, Canada) is the current head coach of the Montreal Canadiens of the National Hockey League. Martin is a career coach who never played a game in the NHL. While in his playing years, Martin played with Mike Keenan for St. Lawrence University as a goaltender.

Coaching career

He served first as a coach of the Peterborough Petes in the Ontario Hockey League and then with the Guelph Platers (where he won a Memorial Cup in 1986) before being briefly promoted to head coach of the St. Louis Blues of the NHL. Martin only served a short while in that position and became an assistant coach of the Quebec Nordiques. When the franchise moved to Denver and became the Colorado Avalanche Martin remained for part of the season before being offered the head coaching position in Ottawa (see below). The Avalanche went on to win the Stanley Cup in 1996.

When the Ottawa Senators, a struggling expansion team with a very poor overall record, needed a new head coach in 1996 they hired Martin. Martin led the team to great regular season success (341–255–96), winning the Northeast Division three times and the President's Trophy once. Martin was thrice nominated for the Jack Adams Award for top NHL coach and won it in 1999.

An unfortunate mar on Martin's record was a long period of performing below expectations in the playoffs, although his supporters maintained that the Senators lacked playoff experience. He finally was able to find productivity in the postseason during the 2002 campaign, when the Senators reached the second round and came within one game of the conference finals. He had most successful postseason in 2003 where the Senators reached game seven of the Eastern Conference finals. After a disappointing 2003–2004 season and an inglorious first round exit from the playoffs Martin was fired. He had been the longest serving coach in the NHL and has turned around a franchise that had gotten off to an awful start as an expansion team.

Martin is a noted defense-first coach who relies on playing a tight defensive game. He made good use of the speedy young talent on Ottawa, and also instills defensive discipline. Despite his reputation as a defensive coach, Ottawa was amongst the top few teams offensively in his last years there. Martin is not a very extroverted coach and is usually soft spoken and lacking much of the fire and charisma of other noted National Hockey League coaches.

On May 26, 2004, Martin was hired as the new head coach of the Florida Panthers, along with his friend Mike Keenan as the new general manager. Martin assumed general manager duties with the resignation of Keenan on September 3, 2006. On March 3, 2007 Jacques Martin coached his 1,000th career NHL game in a 6–2 victory over the Tampa Bay Lightning. In a classy move during the 2002 season, while he was head coach of the Ottawa Senators Jacques Martin stepped away from the bench for 2 games, allowing Hall of Famer Roger Neilson to take the reins and become the ninth man to coach 1,000 career NHL games. As of April 1, 2007, Martin has coached 1009 NHL games, winning 498 for a 47.3% winning percentage and tied for the tenth winningest coach in NHL history.

After three seasons serving as the Panthers head coach, the team announced on April 11, 2008 that Martin would not be back as the bench boss for the upcoming 2008–09 NHL season.

As of June 1, 2009, Martin became the head coach of the Montreal Canadiens.

Coaching record

Team	Year	Regular Season							Post Season
		G	W	L	T	OTL	Pts	Finish	W	L	W%	Result
STL	1986–87	80	32	33	15	-	79	1st in Norris	2	4	.494	Lost in First Round
STL	1987–88	80	34	38	8	-	76	2nd in Norris	5	5	.475	Lost in Second Round
OTT	1995–96	38	10	24	4	-	(41)	6th in Northeast	0	0	--	Missed Playoffs
OTT	1996–97	82	31	36	15	-	77	3rd in Northeast	3	4	.429	Lost in First Round
OTT	1997–98	82	34	33	15	-	83	5th in Northeast	5	6	.455	Lost in Second Round
OTT	1998–99	82	44	23	15	-	103	1st in Northeast	0	4	.000	Lost in First Round
OTT	1999–00	82	41	28	11	2	95	2nd in Northeast	2	4	.333	Lost in First Round
OTT	2000–01	82	48	21	9	4	109	1st in Northeast	0	4	.000	Lost in First Round
OTT	2001–02	80	38	26	9	7	94	3rd in Northeast	7	5	.583	Lost in Second Round
OTT	2002–03	82	52	21	8	1	113	1st in Northeast	11	7	.611	Lost in Conf. Finals
OTT	2003–04	82	43	23	10	6	102	3rd in Northeast	3	4	.429	Lost in First Round
FLA	2005–06	82	37	34	-	11	85	4th in Southeast	0	0	--	Missed Playoffs
FLA	2006–07	82	35	31	-	16	86	4th in Southeast	0	0	--	Missed Playoffs
FLA	2007–08	82	38	35	-	9	85	3rd in Southeast	0	0	--	Missed Playoffs
Total		1,098	517	406	119	56	.552	3 Division Championships	38	47	.447	8 Playoff Appearances

Hockey School

Every summer for over 20 years Jacques has run the Jacques Martin Hockey School for kids age 7 - 17 in Rigaud, Quebec.

External links

• Jacques Martin's career stats at The Internet Hockey Database

Preceded by Jacques Demers	Head Coaches of the St. Louis Blues 1986–1988	Succeeded by Brian Sutter
Preceded by Dave Allison	Head Coaches of the Ottawa Senators 1996–2004	Succeeded by Bryan Murray
Preceded by Pat Burns	Winner of the Jack Adams Award 1999	Succeeded by Joel Quenneville
Preceded by John Torchetti	Head Coaches of the Florida Panthers 2004–2008	Succeeded by Peter DeBoer
Preceded by Bob Gainey	Head Coaches of the Montreal Canadiens 2009-present	Succeeded by incumbent