Pete DeBoer: Mathieu Darche sold me on the Islanders job, ‘really excited’ to work with Matthew Schaefer | amNewYork

May 29, 2025; Dallas, Texas, USA; Dallas Stars head coach Pete DeBoer speaks to the media after the game against the Edmonton Oilers in game five of the Western Conference Final of the 2025 Stanley Cup Playoffs at American Airlines Center. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-Imagn Images

EAST MEADOW, NY — Pete DeBoer had every reason to sit back and wait until half of the NHL began its offseason in two weeks, and then let the offers start rolling in. 

After being let go by the Dallas Stars and spending the 2025-26 season working with Hockey Canada at the Winter Olympics, he was the top available head coach on the market, alongside Bruce Cassidy, who was recently fired by the Vegas Golden Knights, and prominent teams like the Toronto Maple Leafs are likely to make a change behind the bench once the regular season wraps up. 

But he got a call late Saturday night from first-year Islanders general manager Mathieu Darche after his team was bowled over by the Carolina Hurricanes for a fourth-straight loss to deal even more damage to their fading playoff hopes with four games left to play. It is as bizarre a circumstance as any pro hockey coach could step into this late in the season, but the 57-year-old received a pitch from Darche that was obviously too good to pass up. DeBoer was named the new head coach of New York on Sunday afternoon, while Patrick Roy was shown the door after parts of three seasons with the team. 

“Mathieu Darche, he really sold me,” DeBoer said after his first practice with the Islanders on Monday. “I think when I first picked up the phone, my initial reaction was: We’re two weeks away from the offseason. What’s the rush? He sold me on the organization, and the vision, and the direction, and the ownership.”

Islanders hiring Pete DeBoer like ‘grabbing the No.1 free agent,’ Mathieu Darche says

It certainly did not hurt that there are still a number of people in the Islanders organization who worked with DeBoer during his time as New Jersey Devils head coach — staff that was brought over across the Hudson River by former general manager and president of hockey operations, Lou Lamoriello. 

“I won’t B.S. you, the travel’s nice compared to Dallas and San Jose and Vegas,” DeBoer joked, alluding to three of his more prominent coaching stints with the Stars, Sharks, and Golden Knights. “But that’s not the decision. The decision was the people. I can’t believe how many people are still people that Lou brought from my time in New Jersey: trainers and people in management. There’s a real familiarity to the group here.”

Getting an opportunity to coach Matthew Schaefer, the generational rookie defenseman breaking records at every turn, is also a plus. 

“He’s special,” DeBoer said. “I ran the defense at the Olympics for Team Canada, and I did a lot of scouting. The management group included me in all the selection meetings, so we watched very closely all the defensemen in the league, and honestly, I could not believe my eyes the first half of the year in what I was seeing from an 18-year-od. The maturity in his game and how dynamic he was. He was within a razor of being on the Olympic team at 18. So I’m really excited to work with him.”

This is not just an attempt to save the Islanders’ playoff hopes this season. DeBoer has a multi-year deal in place to settle in with his new team, but he is immediately being thrown into the fire in hopes of getting New York back into a playoff spot that it had inhabited for so long this season before this miserable 3-7-0 stretch. 

He does not have time to reinvent the wheel. Instead, it is instilling some “non-negotiables” like seamless line changes, back-checking, and defensive zone coverage. There also needs to be a reminder of just how good a situation this team is still in — and sometimes an outside voice could do wonders.

“I had never spent a season away from the game,” DeBoer said. “When you do that, you get a little different perspective about how fortunate we are to do what we do, how great it is to be in the position we’re in with four games left and a chance to be playing in the playoffs in less than two weeks. I don’t take that for granted. I think sometimes — and I was guilty of it coaching for 18 years — you get in the grind of the wins and the losses and the travel, and you sometimes forget about how exciting this time of year is when you’re in this kind of position.”

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