The Ottawa Senators can scratch one name off their Belleville Senators’ coaching candidate list.
On Friday morning, the New York Islanders announced that Jay McKee had agreed to a contract to become the head coach of their AHL affiliate, the Hamilton Hammers. McKee spent the last nine seasons coaching in the Ontario Hockey League with the Kitchener Rangers and the Hamilton/Brantford Bulldogs.
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McKee’s powerhouse Brantford Bulldogs squad were upset in the OHL semifinals after taking a commanding 3-1 series lead against the Barrie Colts. With several of the organization’s best players expected to graduate, and having spent so much draft capital on talent pursuing a Memorial Cup opportunity, the organization appears poised to endure a downturn in its development cycle.
Recognizing that, it made sense for McKee to explore and pursue other opportunities.
Given his connections and ties to Michael Andlauer and Steve Staios, the prevailing belief was that it was only a matter of time before McKee would join the Ottawa Senators’ organization in some kind of coaching capacity.
Having fired David Bell midseason as the head coach in Belleville and replacing him with Andrew Campbell, who has held the interim head coach tag, there appeared to be a potential vacancy in the organization for McKee to slide into.
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McKee, of course, was the head coach of the Hamilton Bulldogs in Staios’ last year as the organization’s general manager and president. Together, the duo presided over the 2021-22 OHL championship team, while Michael Andlauer continued to own the Bulldogs until he sold the franchise in January of last year.
That combination of familiarity and success made McKee feel like a natural candidate for the job in Belleville, but that obviously will not happen now.
Organizations insist on strong communication and relationships between the parent team and their affiliate, but would the presence of McKee, who has strong ties to the Senators’ general manager and owner, have been viewed as an existential threat to head coach Travis Green’s job?
There is absolutely no question that McKee would have been perceived as an eventual successor, but few coaches in the NHL have more job security than Green after the Senators’ 2025-26 season.
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His team climbed a mountain to defy the odds and overcome the worst statistical goaltending in the league during the first half of the season. Thanks to what was one of the best five-on-five teams in the league analytically, and the play of a resurgent Linus Ullmark, the Senators clinched a second consecutive postseason berth.
Green deserves all the credit for the structure and system the Senators played to keep the team competitive during their goaltenders’ struggles, key injuries to the blue line, and several distractions throughout the season.
Although a loyalty to Nolan Baumgartner may have impacted Green’s reluctance to take away the penalty kill duties from him, that decision was ultimately made and paid dividends down the stretch.
It was a season that merited Jack Adams Trophy consideration.
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With a recently hired Pete DeBoer in New York, there is no clear path for McKee to get an NHL head-coaching opportunity there, but he can continue to hone his craft and develop as a viable candidate for the future.
It feels fair to assume the Senators likely reached out to McKee to gauge interest in the Belleville position, but now they will have to pivot to an alternative. I reached out to the Senators organization for comments on the interim tag status of Andrew Campbell and their search for a prospective head coach, but at the time this article was posted, the organization had not responded.
By Graeme Nichols
The Hockey News
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