New coaches have ties to Murray

Two NHL teams made coaching moves today, as Washington replaced Bruce Boudreau with Dale Hunter, and Carolina replaced Paul Maurice with Kirk Muller. Both new coaches, coincidentally, have ties to Terry Murray. Hunter played in Washington from 1987-99, and Murray was the Capitals’ coach from 1990-94 and an assistant coach during Hunter’s first season in Washington. Murray also coached Muller for one season in Florida (1998-99). Murray chuckled when asked if he ever saw a coaching future for Hunter, a hard-nosed player who routinely compiled more than 200 penalty minutes in a season.

MURRAY: “With Dale? You didn’t at the time. The one thing about Dale Hunter, he’s a great competitor. He was always a player that you had a lot of respect for, because of the way he played. He was a very effective player, played hard and had good skill. I remember, back in his Nordique days, he was playing with Michel Goulet on the left side. Goulet ended up being a 50-goal scorer. He came to Washington and he was a good playmaker, a very effective power-play guy because of his position in front of the net. You guys remember Dmitri Khristich. He came here as an L.A. Kings guy. He put up a big number in Washington, and a lot of that came as a result of playing with Dale Hunter.’’