Coaching Search Update w/ Ken Holland Comments

Insiders.

Been pretty quiet on the coaching search front for the Kings. Frankly, minus the entire saga surrounding Bruce Cassidy and Vegas, there has been very little in the way of concrete information shared about the process. I’ve noticed it as I am sure you have and felt that it was time to push for something more concrete.

Ultimately, I wish I had more for you here, but there isn’t a ton here in the way of real detail and information. Ken Holland was very generous with his time, before flying off to the Memorial Cup to watch Jared Woolley and Vojtech Cihar. It was appreciated. He did share some details I felt were relevant to the process but that’s what the focus was, on the process and less on specific individuals. Which is his prerogative at the end of the day.

Holland detailed that he is the one leading the search from the Kings standpoint. I think that’s an important distinction, in that it will be Holland’s first hire with the Kings. He was a part of the decision to retain Jim Hiller after the 2024-25 season, but that was more of a joint call. Here, it sounds as if Holland is both leading the charge and has the ability to influence the way that the hire goes, in the direction he wants it to.

“I am the one conducting [the search]. I’m talking to a lot of people, I’ve had some interviews and I have some more interviews planned, trying to gather as much information as I can, both through the interview process and I’ve been around a long time, so I know a lot of people in this industry and if I can’t get the information, I know that there’s people who I respect, other General Managers, that I can talk to to get information. I don’t need or want to talk to 20 people but certainly would like to talk to four, six, eight, keep it somewhat tight. The first part of my due diligence was to put a list together and gather information on all those people. Now, I’m working on the interview process. I don’t want to put a timeframe on it, but certainly before the draft and at least a couple of weeks before the draft, on the long end, and make a decision of whether we stick with D.J. Smith or if we go in another direction.”

He used that “4-8” range a couple of different times to describe the number of candidates in play here. He reiterated something that he said during his end of season interview, which was that he did not want to interview 20 candidates. He feels that the main reason to cast a net that widely is more to gather information about his team than to find candidates. He doesn’t feel he needs 20 external perspectives on his team. His focus is on a head coaching search and the additional conversations he is having are about head coaching candidates, not necessarily seeking that input from candidates. From what he discussed, the list he started with has more or less aligned with the direction he’s gone. Holland has done interviews, but beyond that 4-8 number, he did not share further specifics.

With regards to Bruce Cassidy, I did ask him directly about Cassidy and his answer was naturally pretty diplomatic and not very revealing.

“The process is, pretty much everyone is under contract to somebody, so you have to ask for permission and then it’s that team’s right to determine if they want to grant permission or if they don’t want to grant permission. Over the years, I’ve had some calls about maybe not head coaches, but people called and we didn’t want to let them go and we found a way to keep them. That’s your right, that’s what you’ve negotiated when you sign people to a contract. I’ve been around the game a long time to know that if somebody’s decided that they don’t want to grant permission, they’ve negotiated that right and you move on.”

Vegas General Manager Kelly McCrimmon said earlier this week that teams had reached out regarding Cassidy. His answer is embedded below.

Kelly McCrimmon regarding Bruce Cassidy: "Teams have asked for permission to speak with Bruce. We've been consistent that our focus currently is on the Stanley Cup Playoffs, and the teams have respected that. I've spoken with Bruce. He understands this, as well."

— Danny Webster (@DannyWebster21) May 20, 2026

It’s a situation that Holland certainly seemed to understand. I think that the Kings would like to talk to Cassidy if given the chance. He is an accomplished Head Coach and won a championship in Vegas. It’s natural that Los Angeles, Edmonton and likely several other teams would like to talk with him about current openings, but at this time, that isn’t allowed for the Kings. The rule doesn’t make a ton of sense to me, but with Cassidy under contract in Vegas for another season, the Golden Knights are fully within their right to withhold that permission, regardless of Cassidy’s stated desire to coach or the NHL Coaches Association’s displeasure with the situation. Should the situation change, perhaps he is an option for the Kings. Right now, he is not.

Regarding other NHL Head Coaches who have their rights currently held by other teams, I think it’s probably more common than we might think.

Coaches who were relieved of their duties with multiple years on their contracts would still remain in the same boat, though those teams are typically motivated to get that salary off their books. Kris Knoblauch, for example, has three years remaining on his contract with the Oilers and is entitled to all of that money, with the Oilers controlling his negotiation rights for three years as a result. That’s through 2029. Overall, Toronto, Edmonton and Vancouver made coaching changes already this summer and there are assistant coaches in the NHL as well as AHL coaches under contract with NHL organizations who would require that kind of permission. There are also coaches who have been fired in recent seasons who you might not think of as being under contract still, but they are. Cassidy is the name who is being talked about, but this process is extremely common, at a variety of levels, as Holland indicated.

“Most of the best coaches in the world are probably employed around the National Hockey League, either as head coaches or assistant coaches. Sometimes, when you’ve been a head coach and it hasn’t worked out, I think that’s a good thing versus a bad thing. I think sometimes you need to be in the chair once or twice. I know I’ve looked back at my first year or two when I was the General Manager in 1997 in Detroit, I’d probably do a couple of things a little different now than I did back then. Then, there are some very good coaches that are coaching in college. So, I’ve gone through the whole list, I’ve narrowed it down and now I’m going through the interview process. I want to find the best coach that I can for this team.”

In terms of other coaches who are on teams still playing, I think the Kings would like to get this process completed before the playoffs conclude. Coaches who were eliminated in Rounds 1 and 2 naturally can be approached with permission and there are some prominent names there. Coaches on Carolina, Montreal, Vegas and Colorado are likely not options at this point. It could impact the search a bit, maybe a candidate or two, but waiting for two more rounds to be completed is likely just too long for Holland to wait.

“I probably don’t anticipate waiting until June 20, until the Stanley Cup Finals are over. We’re down to the final four right now, there’s two more weeks to go in this round. I’d like to get something done before the draft, because there are other big decisions that need to be made in terms of player planning on our team. If someone wins the Stanley Cup and there’s a really good person there, if we’re still looking, maybe I will, but if we find somebody [first] who we think is going to be the best coach then we’ll name it and move on.”

Regarding D.J. Smith, he is currently in Switzerland coaching Team Canada at the IIHF World Championships.

Holland said that he spoke with Smith before he left for the tournament and they have touched base quickly a couple of times while he’s been at the tournament. Holland said that player feedback during exit interviews was strong when it came to Smith’s performance down the stretch, with players feeling the team played differently after the change. However, while he did feel that style of play improved, the Kings struggled to win games against upper-echelon teams in the NHL in March and April. All in all, the sample size was small and these are all factors to be considered with D.J. Smith’s candidacy.

“It appeared that they responded to him. We did play at about a .610 winning percentage, which would be around ninth in the NHL, but it’s a short window and it feels like there’s usually a bump with a coaching change, so I’ve got to factor that in.”

Regardless of who he goes with, Holland reiterated two areas that are a part of the conversations – improving special teams and getting more offense from the defensemen.

Scoring in general is a priority, but I think that power play and offense from the blueline are the two most pressing areas where those things need to come. The Kings didn’t score enough 5-on-5 last season either but of the three, that feels the more likely to regress to the mean, as the Kings ranked in the top half of the NHL in 5-on-5 scoring from 2022-25. The others, though, are more worrying.

Special teams were down across the board this season, as the Kings ranked towards the bottom of the league in both. They also ranked last in the NHL in goals from the blueline and third to last in points from defensemen. Holland said that all three need to change going into next season. the special teams seem like things that need to be addressed more through a coaching search, though with the defensemen, he admitted personnel changes are part of it, alongside style and system changes.

“Special teams have to improve. We were 30th in penalty killing and 28th in power play. It’s hard to think that if we go into next year again and we’re in the bottom of the league in both categories, that we’re going to make the playoffs. Special teams have to improve……We’ve got to get a little bit more attack out of our defense. Whether it’s changing the personnel and finding somebody or do we play a little bit different. I think we were 30th in the league [in points from defensemen]. It’s a little bit of a theme here. I was looking the other day, over the last four years, at points by defensemen. This year and two years ago, we were 30th and 23rd. There were a couple of years [2024-25 and 2022-23] that we were 15th, 17th. We’ve got to get back to the middle of the pack, to where we get a little bit more offense from our defense. Part of that is personnel wise, part of that is the way that we play. Those are some of my conversations that I’m talking about with the head coaching personnel. I think those are two areas.”

So that’s that.

Wouldn’t expect a hire to be made tomorrow. Holland spent lots of time gathering information on the coaches on his shortlist and he is now in the process of interviewing those individuals. I would think we’re probably looking at an early-June decision at this point, out of respect to Smith’s participation at the World Championships, however should the right external candidate come into focus, the Kings likely won’t wait.