Islanders promote Rick Kowalsky to head coach of AHL Bridgeport
Devils assistant coach Rick Kowalsky talks to the team during a timeout in the third period of an NHL game against the Panthers on Feb. 11, 2020, in Newark, N.J. Credit: AP
The Islanders didn’t wait long to hire the most obvious candidate to coach their top minor-league affiliate.
Rick Kowalsky was promoted on Thursday to succeed Brent Thompson as the bench boss for the Islanders’ AHL affiliate in Bridgeport. Thompson departed on Tuesday to be an assistant to new Anaheim Ducks coach Greg Cronin after serving 10 seasons over two tenures as Bridgeport’s coach.
Kowalsky, 51, spent the two previous seasons as Thompson’s assistant.
Neither Kowalsky, Islanders president/general manager Lou Lamoriello nor Bridgeport GM Chris Lamoriello were immediately available for comment.
The two Lamoriellos also held those respective roles in the Devils’ organization until 2015 and Kowalsky served as the Devils’ AHL coach from 2010-18, the first seven seasons in Albany and then one season in Binghamton.
He was named the AHL coach of the year in 2016 when Albany set franchise records with 46 wins and 102 points. Kowalsky also served as a Devils’ assistant coach under John Hynes, Alain Nasreddine and Lindy Ruff from 2018-21 before joining the Bridgeport staff.
Kowalsky, from Simcoe, Ontario, was a 10th-round pick of the Buffalo Sabres in 1992 and played professionally from 1993-2005, splitting his playing career between the AHL and the lower-tier ECHL. He was the captain when Trenton won ECHL’s Kelly Cup championship in his final season as a player. In all, Kowalsky, a right wing, had 221 goals, 329 assists and 979 penalty minutes in 516 ECHL games and 35 goals and 57 assists in 183 AHL games.
He was inducted into the ECHL hall of fame in 2017.
Kowalsky becomes Bridgeport’s first new coach since Thompson took over again for the 2014-15 season. The Islanders did not make any further announcements on Kowalsky’s staff or the status of Chris Terreri, who has been Bridgeport’s goalie coach since 2017.
Andrew Gross joined Newsday in 2018 to cover the Islanders. He began reporting on the NHL in 2003 and has previously covered the Rangers and Devils. Other assignments have included the Jets, St. John’s and MLB.
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