Elliotte Friedman

And I think Laviolette is in there with those two as a legit candidate.

I just think that, first of all, I think Laviolette wants to coach.

So we did a piece with Tortorella, and I said that when I texted Tortorella last year at the end of the season, I said, do you want to coach or are you retired?

It's as fast as he's ever gotten back to me.

I want to coach.

I said the same text to LaViolette last year during the cycle.

I said, do you want a coach or you don't?

And he phoned me right away.

Like Torral didn't even bother to call really hurt about that.

I have to tell you, I was still mortally wounded, but LaViolette called right away and he's like, no, I want a coach.

And you know what, like one thing that's happened with him this year is that he's been doing a lot of media.

And I know a lot of people who didn't really know him well before who've told me they really liked listening to him.

Like, I think it's been good for him, um, that, you know, people have heard him because sometimes, you know, one interesting thing about LaViolette is.

Like all these coaches, they take losing really personally, but LaViolette has admitted before that some of his press conferences after losing are so bad because he just can't handle it.

So I think a lot of people look at him and say, this guy just seems like when he, when he has the year, like he had in, in New York and obviously it wasn't solely on him.

A lot of things were going wrong there.

He just, he could come across as like, oh my God, like that guy is so miserable.

And this year, as he's been doing a lot more media and just talking hockey, like I said, I know people like, wow, like there's, I think people have been really impressed listening to him.

So, um, I just think the guy really wants to coach like LA to me, like, you know, with the way they lost in the first round, they played really hard, but they were, they're a lot like you can't compare that to where Vegas is and Tortorella was walking in and saying, um,

Like it was just, his car was just like plugging the keys.