The Penguins didn’t wait for their top minor-league coach to take a job elsewhere to begin the search for his successor.
John Hynes, who coached their Wilkes-Barre/Scranton farm team for the past five years, will be introduced as coach of the New Jersey Devils at a news conference in Newark this afternoon.
General manager Jim Rutherford, however, said Monday he and his staff already had “started to put together a list of potential guys” to replace Hynes.
And Rutherford made it clear there will be one key criterion when choosing the Baby Penguins’ next coach.
“The biggest thing is that he’s a good teacher, that he can help to develop players,” he said.