2025 Exit Interviews – Jim Hiller

Naturally, after yesterday morning’s news, you’re wondering what the future holds for Jim Hiller.

In many ways, so is he.

Kings President Luc Robitaille is scheduled to address the media today at 2 PM Pacific at Toyota Sports Performance Center. In that time, he will be posted questions regarding the team’s mutual decision with Rob Blake to part ways in the General Manager position, which then directs attention towards the future of Hiller as the team’s Head Coach. Assume Robitaille will be asked that question directly as well.

Hiller has been around the industry long enough to know the process. As of yesterday morning, he had not yet met with Robitaille to debrief the 2024-25 season and obviously he has not met with the team’s new general manager at this time.

“I haven’t had any of those conversations yet,” Hiller said yesterday. “I’ll be talking with Luc at some point, I’m sure, but I do understand that whenever there’s change like that, significant change, there’s usually more.”

That will happen in the coming days, if it hasn’t already.

So, until those meetings are had, he is proceeding as he normally would at the end of the season.

That includes meeting with players to de-brief what was and to provide a plan looking forward. He understands he still has conversations that need to be had between he and Robitaille and from there, likely between he and the team’s new general manager. Until those meetings happen, though, until that time comes, he’s proceeding as he would have, which is all you can really ask.

“I’m proceeding for sure like I’m the head coach,” Hiller added. “At some point I will talk to Luc and then at some point Luc, or I assume it’s Luc, is going to do a search for the GM and hire a GM and then at some point I would assume I would be speaking with [that person]. So, it’s status quo for me. There’s players here that have to be talked to and given a plan and and all those types of things.”

As he looks back, Hiller has to balance what was one of the most successful regular seasons in team history and one of the most crushing playoff defeats.

The Kings tied franchise records in wins (48) and points (105) over the course of a very successful 82-game season that saw the team rebuild a culture that was not where it once was. Hiller played a big role in that, bringing with him his own approach to the job. He did things unconventionally in many ways and while doing things unconventionally leaves yourself open to criticism, Hiller proceeded with what he felt was best, for better or for worse. Over 82 games, those things largely worked.

Then came the playoffs and everything seemed to be working again off the hop. Victories in Games 1 and 2 gave the Kings their best opportunity yet to advance past the first round since 2014. Then came blown third-period leads in Games 3 and 4, which changed the course of the series, before a poor showing in Game 5 and a spirited showing in a season-ending loss in Game 6. Number of different things you can point to within the series that ultimately swung things the direction of the Oilers, with players commenting on several of those things yesterday. Hiller found himself with a mixed emotion on balancing the two.

“It’s mixed emotions, for sure,” Hiller said, when asked about the difficulty in separating regular-season success from playoff disappointment. “The guys competed. I just feel, I guess, bad for all of us, for the whole organization, for all you guys, you wanted to be still working and following us through the playoffs, but for the players who gave, I believe, gave so much this year, trusted one another, competed hard for one another. That’s what my biggest feelings of disappointment are, because as much as we put everything we have into it, they have to go to the job.”

In terms of evaluating his own performance and that of the coaching staff during the series, Hiller said the loss is still to fresh to dive into that. Or at least it was yesterday morning. The Kings saw their season come to an end on Thursday, so we’re not even a week out.

There are certainly things that happened in the series that the coaching staff was responsible for, for better or for worse. Those include the challenge in Game 3, the reliance on heavy-minute players, especially in Games 3 and 4 and the two leads lost in those two games, as well as a lot of the things that put the Kings in a 2-0 series lead, as well as being in a strong position to lead 3-0 or 3-1.

“You can always look back and say maybe we could have done this or could have done that,” Hiller said. “I think every time you lose, no matter who you’re playing, if you don’t win or achieve your goal, you always think maybe we should do this better or different. In the end, you make decisions in the moment with the information you have. It didn’t turn up for us.”

On those topics, Hiller had the following quotes, as shown in the video above –

On what he and the staff saw on the coaches challenge in Game 3, in hindsight
Well, in hindsight, it’s really easy. In the moment, it was more difficult. We were disappointed with the way it went. We would’ve liked to come out and kill the penalty after, I think that compounds the call. That was a big moment, there was no question. I think if people have chance to watch it for themselves and back it up, not necessarily right at the moment, but prior to the puck going around the net, there’s different things to look at, but I don’t have to get into it, it’s over and done.

On if the team changed its approach during third periods of Games 3 and 4
No. If you look back through the season, I think third periods were one of our strengths. I think what sometimes people fail to do is to give the other team credit, especially when they’re pushing, they’re in their building and we saw a lot of 97 and 29 in those moments for them. Good players, they’re hard to hard to contain. I thought we did, obviously not good enough, but a pretty good job of not giving up a lot, but they were able to find it, they were able to score bit goals when they needed them, so I give them credit.

Hiller also addressed the topic of shortening the bench over a few different answers, so I’ll paraphrase those into one paragraph.

What I gathered first was that if Tanner Jeannot was available for the series, the fourth line would have played more than they did, or certainly had a longer leash at least. Secondly, it was clear that the Kings saw the Oilers as a team that relied on their top-end players, resulting in a more top-heavy approach. The Kings game-planned specifically for Edmonton. Had they played Vegas or another team, Hiller said the approach may have gone differently, as it would have if the Kings advanced. You can rely on 13 guys in a short series, which the Kings almost got. But they didn’t and in Game 5, it bit them. Hiller said that decisions were made in the series and whether you agree with them or not, whether they’re conventional or not, he did what he felt was best to get wins. Ultimately, it turned out not to work in his favor on that front, with a team that was nothing like itself in Game 5, with emotional and physical fatigue playing a large factor.

Regarding the future for Hiller, we could have some clarity later on this afternoon. As noted, Robitaille will speak publicly at 2 PM and will likely provide his thoughts on where the organization goes from here.