Was Dominique Ducharme a victim of injustice?
As a reminder, Dominique Ducharme was relieved of his duties as head coach of the Montreal Canadiens earlier today. His replacement will be announced later on Wednesday.
The Quebecer simply did not live up to the expectations placed on him this year, namely to be successful, especially after a trip to the Stanley Cup Final. He accumulated a 23-46-14 record during his time in Montreal.
At first glance, that doesn't sound very rewarding, that's for sure, but maybe you have to take the context into consideration, according to Raphaël Doucet.
Ducharme had to manage a club in the middle of a pandemic, so he never had the opportunity to be in his chair under normal conditions.
In addition, even though he led the team to the Stanley Cup finals last summer, he couldn't get the team under his belt, having arrived in the middle of February.
He also lost several members of his leadership committee in the off-season, including injuries to Carey Price and Shea Weber, not to mention the departures of Tomas Tatar, Phillip Danault and Corey Perry.
The team also had its share of COVID-19 cases during the season, which did not help the Habs at all.
Marc Bergevin changed the team's image in a short period of time, which probably hurt the atmosphere in the dressing room and on the ice.
These may be excuses, but it's a lot of negatives, which obviously affected Dominique Ducharme's job.
However, when a coach loses his locker room, it's almost impossible to get out of the jam...
He definitely didn't have it easy during his short time in Montreal.
