The Rangers’ offseason changes have arrived to the AHL Hartford staff.
Head coach Grant Potulny, assistant coach Jamie Tardif and assistant coach Paul Mara have been fired by the Wolf Pack, the Blueshirts announced Sunday.
Hartford finished last in the Atlantic Division with 60 points this season and missed the Calder Cup playoffs for the second year in a row, coinciding with the Blueshirts’ disappointing campaign that ended with the last team in the Eastern Conference and in the middle of a general retooling.
Potulny has been in charge of the Wolf Pack’s final two seasons, taking over after the 2023-24 season as Kris Knoblauch left to become the Oilers’ head coach and assistant Steve Smith took over on an interim basis.
Before that, Potulny coached Northern Michigan for seven seasons.
Tardif has been an assistant at Hartford since the 2022-23 season, while Mara joined the coaching staff in December 2023 after initially being hired as a player development assistant in August.
Now, when the Rangers and Wolf Pack begin their next season, Hartford’s staff will identify the latest layer of the organization’s evolution that will look different. Jed Ortmeyer left to pursue other opportunities, The Post’s Molly Walker reported Friday, after serving as director of player development since 2017.
Tanner Glass, who has been assistant director of player development since 2019, was officially promoted on the Rangers’ website a day after news of Ortmeyer’s exit broke.
The Blueshirts have mostly struggled to develop prospects in recent years, with the exception of Gaby Perreault (first-round pick in 2023) and Noah Lapa (fourth-round pick in 2022) who both carved out roles with the NHL club last year.
Recent top 10 picks Alexis Lafrenière (2020), Kaapo Kakko (2019) and Vitali Kravtsov (2018) have all been disappointing, as Kakko and Kravtsov are no longer with the Rangers and former overall pick Lafrenière needs to prove that his recent breakthrough was more than just another blip.
A lot of the Rangers’ problems start with their NHL roster.
This, more than anything else, is why last season was on the rise.
But as they await the long offseason, their initial moves have focused on the foundation, on prospects and development, and on the personnel directly responsible for shaping the specific pieces to determine the Blueshirts’ next step.