The Toronto Maple Leafs are hiring the former captain of one of their biggest rivals.
Daniel Alfredsson is joining Jim Hiller’s coaching staff as an associate coach, the Leafs announced Tuesday.
“Daniel’s experience, leadership and understanding of the game speak for themselves,” said Hiller in a statement.
John Gruden and Brad Werenka were also named assistant coaches. The team announced that Mike Van Ryn and Derek Lalonde, both members of Craig Berube’s coaching staff, would not return.
Alfredsson, who spent the last three seasons as an assistant coach with the Senators, will be an option to oversee the Leafs’ power play next season.
Alfredsson’s decision to join a rival in his post-playing career is sure to rankle a Senators fan base already processing the loss of team captain Brady Tkachuk.
“One of the first moves we made after taking over the franchise was bringing Daniel Alfredsson back into the fold as an assistant coach in December of 2023,” Senators owner Michael Andlauer said in a statement. “I quickly learned that ‘Alfie’ embodied all the characteristics of what it meant to be an Ottawa Senator.
“While I wish he wasn’t joining an arch rival, ‘Alfie’ is forever an Ottawa Senator and the door will always be open for his return. He has done so much for our organization and community and he has my full respect.”
The 53-year-old Alfredsson has a connection to the Leafs as a frequent former teammate of Mats Sundin, the Leafs’ new senior executive adviser, with the Swedish national team, including on the gold medal-winning squad at the 2006 Olympics.
The two were more famously rivals in the NHL as captains of the Senators and Leafs, battling in the playoffs year after year.
It remains to be seen how his hiring will be received by Leafs fans, who cheered against Alfredsson during the peak years of the Battle of Ontario. Alfredsson drew the ire of Leafs Nation on multiple occasions — including for a hit on Darcy Tucker in the 2002 playoffs that preceded the Senators captain’s game-winning goal, and for mocking Sundin after the Leafs captain was suspended for accidentally throwing a broken stick into the crowd.
The Senators had the eighth-ranked power play in the NHL last season.
The Leafs, conversely, struggled so mightily in the first half with their power play that Marc Savard, the assistant coach who ran the unit, was fired two days before Christmas. Under Steve Sullivan’s watch, the unit turned a corner in the second half and ultimately finished 15th.
Alfredsson will have a wealth of talent to work with, including Auston Matthews and William Nylander as well as newcomers Darren Raddysh and Gavin McKenna.
It will be strange, to say the least, to see him behind the bench of the Leafs.
A member of the Hockey Hall of Fame, Alfredsson registered 35 goals and 75 points in 84 regular season games against the Leafs. He added another seven goals and 15 points in 24 playoff games.
The view from Ottawa
Senators fans likely won’t take this news too well as Alfredsson is considered to be something of a symbolic talisman. The Swede is the franchise leader in goals, assists, points, power-play and short-handed goals. He is second in games played, one behind defenceman Chris Phillips.
Known affectionately as “Alfie” in Ottawa, he was in the midst of his second act with the Senators franchise, having just finished his third season as an assistant coach. Under his guidance, the Senators’ power play had a 24 percent conversion rate last season. Conversely, the Senators’ power play dried up this past postseason at a 4.8 percent rate, the worst of any of the 16 teams in the playoffs this spring.
Alfredsson spent 17 seasons with the Senators as a player, scoring 444 career goals and 1,157 career points with the team. But following failed contract negotiations with management and ownership, he left the team in 2013 to join the Detroit Red Wings for his final NHL season. He intended to play in 2014-15, but a back injury forced him to retire. In December 2014, he signed a one-day contract to retire as a Senator. Two years later, Alfredsson’s No. 11 was the first number retired by the present-day iteration of the franchise.
Alfredsson previously spent two seasons, from 2015 to 2017, as a senior adviser to hockey operations before returning to Ottawa in a player development role in 2023. By December of that year, Alfredsson joined interim head coach Jacques Martin’s coaching staff. Alfredsson then became a permanent assistant coach in 2024, as part of Travis Green’s staff. — Julian McKenzie