Patrick Roy can succeed in New York if he understands one thing

Patrick Roy only made it three full seasons as the head coach of the Colorado Avalanche from 2013-16. Roy ended up resigning from the position due to the lack of say in some of the decisions being made by then-general manager Joe Sakic. Now, the Hall of Fame goaltender gets another shot at being a head coach.

The New York Islanders decided to give their recent vacant head coaching job to Roy on Saturday.

Roy had spent the last five seasons as the head coach of the Quebec Remparts of the QMJHL Before his stint as the Avalanche head coach, Roy spent another eight seasons as the head coach of the Remparts. The fact that he got two stints with the same team in the same position is pretty interesting to me.

As the head coach of the Colorado Avalanche, Patrick Roy made the playoffs in just one of his three seasons—the first year. He had a 130-92-24 record. Something I remember fondly of his time as head coach of the Avs was his players consistently trying to skate in their own zone trying to get the right positioning in to crash the net. It used to drive me absolutely nuts seeing that game in and game out.

During his coaching career, Roy has accomplished the following: Memorial Cup – with Quebec Remparts in 2006 and 2023, Jack Adams Award – 2014, Maurice Filion Trophy – 2022, Gilles-Courteau Trophy - with Quebec Remparts in 2023

I am all for giving guys second chances and who knows, maybe Roy will end up having a lot more success than he did with the Avalanche. He will probably have to come to terms with the fact that he will not have full say in roster building or whatever he really wanted in Colorado during his stint there.

The Colorado Avalanche recently played their only matchup against the Islanders this season, so there won’t be any sort of “revenge” game—if you’re into that sort of thing.