Oilers Hire New Head Coach

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The Edmonton Oilers have announced the hiring of both Pat Quinn and Tom Renney to their coaching staff. Official release HERE.

Quinn played for the Edmonton Oil Kings before several years in the NHL where he compiled 950 PIM in 606 games for Toronto and Atlanta. His coaching career began in the late 1970's in Philadelphia and he went on to coach in Los Angeles, Vancouver and finally Toronto until 2005-06. Since then he has worked with Hockey Canada and led the U18 team to success at the 2008 Ivan Hlinka Memorial tournament and most recently the U20 squad at the 2009 WJC in Ottawa.

On a side note, Quinn has part ownership of the WHL's Vancouver Giants.

Jordan Eberle, who played for Quinn in Ottawa, will join us on The Pipeline Show tonight to get the Oiler prospect perspective of today's news.

Tom Renney coached in the WHL for two years on the bench of the Kamloops Blazers before moveing to Hockey Canada's National Program for two more seasons. He then moved to the NHL with Vancouver for a couple of years but spent the last 5 seasons in the Big Apple behind the bench of the New York Rangers.

There were reports that one of the Oilers assistant coaches from last year would be retained and while most felt that Charlie Huddy would be the lucky one it was announced that Kelly Buchberger is actually the coach who will stick around.

One other interesting tidbit, it was made clear today that there might still be another addition to the coaching staff but that was not a 'for sure'. Let me offer up the name of Medicine Hat's Willie Desjardins as a solid candidate for an assistant coaching spot. He's got successful history with Quinn from the WJC and the new head coach made reference to solid CHL coaches that have made the jump to the NHL recently. Makes sense and it would be a great choice that I mentioned in early April. The Tigers have developed a ton of talent over the last several years and Desjardins deserves a large amount of credit for that success.