Columbus Blue Jackets

Columbus Blue Jackets winger Johnny Gaudreau, 31, and his brother Matthew, 29, died Thursday.

The Blue Jackets confirmed the deaths of both men in a statement released Friday morning.

Gaudreau's family also released a statement (h/t Dan Roche of WBZ-TV):

"The National Hockey League family is shocked and saddened by the tragic passing of Columbus Blue Jackets forward Johnny Gaudreau and his brother Matthew," NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman said in a statement. "While Johnny's infectious spirit for the game and show-stopping skills on the ice earned him the nickname 'Johnny Hockey,' he was more than just a dazzling hockey player; he was a doting father and beloved husband, son, brother and teammate who endeared himself to every person fortunate enough to have crossed his path."

Per ABC 6 in Philadelphia, New Jersey state troopers confirmed Johnny and Matthew Gaudreau were killed when a vehicle hit them while they were riding their bikes around 8:30 p.m. local time on Thursday night.

The driver of the vehicle "is suspected of being under the influence of alcohol at the time of the crash," police said, according to ABC.

According to ESPN, "Both brothers, who were New Jersey natives, had been in the area to be groomsmen in their sister Katie's wedding that was scheduled for Friday in Philadelphia."

Johnny Gaudreau played college hockey at Boston College from 2011 to '14. He helped the Eagles win the national championship during the 2011-12 season and was awarded the Hobey Baker Award as the top men's player in the country for the 2013-14 season.

The Calgary Flames originally selected Gaudreau in the fourth round of the 2011 NHL draft. He signed his entry-level contract with the club on the same day as the ceremony at which he won the Hobey Baker Award.

Gaudreau made his NHL debut with the Flames on the final day of the 2013-14 regular season. He became a full-time player in 2014-15, earning a spot on the All-Rookie team in his first full season.

After spending the first nine seasons of his career with the Flames, Gaudreau signed a seven-year contract with the Blue Jackets as a free agent. He appeared in 161 games over the past two seasons with Columbus.

Gaudreau appeared in a total of 763 games over 11 seasons in the NHL. He scored 743 points, with a career-high 115 coming during the 2021-22 campaign.

Matthew Gaudreau was a professional hockey player in the ECHL. He most recently played for the Worcester Railers during the 2021-22 season. He also played one season for the Reading Royals.

The Columbus Blue Jackets officially appointed Dean Evason as the organization's new head coach on Monday.

General manager Don Waddell released the following statement:

Dean Evason brings to coaching what he brought as a player—passion, hard work and tenacity—and I couldn't be happier that he will serve as the next head coach of the Columbus Blue Jackets. He has spent well over two decades in this league as a player, assistant coach and head coach and I believe that experience, combined with the outstanding person he is, will allow Dean to get the best out of our players and put us in a position to succeed as a team.

According to Brian Hedger of the Columbus Dispatch, the Blue Jackets "went back and forth" in contract talks with Todd McLellan over several weeks, and McLellan "was excited about the prospect of coming to Columbus and wasn't asking for $5.5 million per season."

But a contract was reportedly never offered, and the Blue Jackets went with Evason instead.

It concludes what could only be described as a whirlwind last year for the team from a head-coaching perspective.

Columbus fired Brad Larsen in April 2023 after he went two seasons without making a playoff appearance. Mike Babock was hired to replace him but never coached a game for the team, resigning in Sept. 2023 in the wake of an NHL Players' Association investigation into questionable conduct in his dealings with players.

The Blue Jackets then named associate coach Pascal Vincent the head coach ahead of the 2023-24 season but fired him after a miserable season that saw the team accumulate just 66 points, worst in the Eastern Conference.

The hope will be that Evason rights the ship. The 57-year-old went 147-77-27 in parts of five seasons as the head coach for the Minnesota Wild (2019-20 to 2023-24), leading the team to four playoff berths.

He also spent seven seasons as an assistant for the Washington Capitals and played in the NHL for 13 seasons as a center.

"I am incredibly proud and honored to be named the head coach of the Columbus Blue Jackets and appreciate very much the opportunity that Don, the McConnell family and Mike Priest have extended to me," he said in a statement. "There is a great core and a lot of young talent on this team. I am really looking forward to working with this group and helping us become a team that plays extremely hard and competes at the highest level."

Pascal Vincent's tenure as the head coach of the Columbus Blue Jackets lasted just one season.

Columbus announced Monday that it "relieved" him of his head-coaching duties and will "immediately" begin searching for his replacement following a disappointing 27-43-12 campaign in 2023-24.

NHL insider Elliotte Friedman initially reported the Blue Jackets were moving on from Vincent.

To say Vincent faced a difficult challenge in his first year as a head coach in the NHL would be quite the understatement.

He was never supposed to be in that position for the Blue Jackets, as the team hired Mike Babcock prior to the 2023-24 season. Babcock had previously coached the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim, Detroit Red Wings and Toronto Maple Leafs during a lengthy career and was a notable name coming to Columbus.

However, he ended up resigning in September before he ever coached a game for the Metropolitan Division club.

As ESPN's Ryan S. Clark relayed, the resignation followed allegations he violated players' privacy by asking them to show him pictures on their cellphones. Multiple NHLPA executives met with Columbus players to investigate the situation, and he eventually resigned.

"Our players deserve to be treated with respect in the workplace," NHLPA executive director Marty Walsh said at the time. "Unfortunately, that was not the case in Columbus. The club's decision to move forward with a new head coach is the appropriate course of action."

Vincent was then thrown into the head-coaching role shortly before the start of the season.

He had some experience as an assistant coach for the Winnipeg Jets for five seasons and the head coach of the team's AHL affiliate, the Manitoba Moose, for five more. Columbus hired him as an associate coach before the 2021-22 season.

Yet the team never found its footing under Vincent and was an afterthought in the playoff discussion for much of the season.

Patrik Laine played just 18 games, Johnny Gaudreau scored a career-worst 12 goals and highly regarded rookie Adam Fantilli was limited to 49 games. Presumed franchise goaltender Elvis Merzļikins was also inconsistent at best with an .897 save percentage and 3.45 goals against average.

Columbus has a number of young players and the No. 4 overall pick of the 2024 NHL draft. It is clearly looking ahead to the future, and it wants a new coach leading the way even if Vincent was put into a difficult situation.

It seems like forward Patrik Laine's time with the Columbus Blue Jackets could be coming to an end.

"He would like to move on," Pierre LeBrun of TSN reported Wednesday (2:40 mark). "His agent has had conversations with the Blue Jackets about it. Both sides are going to work together to try to get that done. He wants a fresh start, hasn't been a good time in Columbus."

Columbus first acquired Laine via trade from the Winnipeg Jets during the 2020-21 season and then signed him to a four-year contract extension in July 2022. While that extension runs through the 2025-26 season, it doesn't seem like he will finish it with the Blue Jackets.

There was a time when the 26-year-old looked like one of the most promising young players in the NHL.

He was named to the NHL All-Rookie First Team in 2016-17 and then led the league with 20 power-play goals in just his second season. Laine notched a career-high 70 points on 44 goals and 26 assists in that second campaign.

It was one of four straight seasons with 50 or more points to start his career, but he hasn't played more than 56 games in a season since that stretch. While he reached the 50-point mark in each of his first two full seasons with the Blue Jackets, he also posted a combined plus-minus total of minus-19.

That was after he finished with a minus-29 in 45 games with Columbus in 2020-21.

Laine played just 18 games this past season in part because of a fractured left clavicle. He also entered the NHL/NHLPA player assistance program in January.

"After careful consideration and discussion with my support network and the team, I have recognized the importance of prioritizing my mental health and well-being," Laine said on Instagram at the time (h/t Stephen Whyno of the Associated Press). "Hockey has been my passion and my life, but I have come to realize that in order to perform at my best, I need to take this time to focus on myself."

It seems like he is ready for a change of scenery at this point, and the Blue Jackets are reportedly willing to work with him to find just that.

Six months after going public with the information that he was in kidney failure, longtime Columbus Blue Jackets reporter Aaron Portzline is set to receive a kidney transplant thanks to a Blue Jackets employee.

According to WOSU 89.7's Allie Vugrincic, Blue Jackets communications specialist Lindy Noel said she was "inspired" to see if she was a match for Portzline after he announced his diagnosis in October, and it was determined in March that she was.

Portzline, who has covered the Blue Jackets since their inception first for the Columbus Dispatch and now for The Athletic, has polycystic kidney disease, which runs in his family.

He has had to undergo dialysis regularly as a result, but that will no longer be the case once he receives a new kidney from Noel this week.

Portzline said that over the past several months, there were multiple occasions when he came close to being a match with a donor kidney, but there was no perfect match until Noel's selfless act.

While Portzline and Noel know each other and have interacted in the past, they have never worked closely together, which speaks even more to Noel's compassion.

Portzline called it "an incredible, charitable act," and called for anyone with interest in becoming an organ donor to take the necessary steps to make it happen since doing so can save lives.

The Columbus Blue Jackets announced Thursday they fired Jarmo Kekalainen as general manager.

President of hockey operations John Davidson will assume interim GM duties for the time being.

"This is one of the hardest days I have had in my career as Jarmo is a friend, someone I have a great deal of respect for and someone who has done a lot of good things during his time here," Davidson said in a statement. "While the future of our club is bright, our performance has not been good enough and it is time for a fresh perspective as we move forward."

Kekalainen took over as the GM in February 2013. During his tenure, the franchise achieved a level of sustained success that had been elusive since it entered the league in 2000. The Blue Jackets reached the playoffs in 2013-14 and started a four-year playoff streak in 2016-17.

The 57-year-old's experience as a scout was evident. He built a perennial contender on the strength of some excellent trades and identifying undervalued assets.

However, Kekalainen has been unable to repeat the process after many of the key stars responsible for those multiple postseason trips moved on.

The Blue Jackets are on pace to finish with a points percentage below .500 for the fourth straight season, and they're heading toward a last-place finish in the Eastern Conference for a second successive campaign.

Kekalainen's big gambits to accelerate the rebuild haven't worked out.

Johnny Gaudreau's return (28 goals and 81 assists) on the ice hasn't been terrible so far, but his six-year, $68.3 million contract is a tough pill to swallow on a team this bad. Patrik Laine's four-year, $34.8 million pact also hasn't aged well.

Kekalainen's unwillingness to embrace a full-scale rebuild has left the franchise in a much worse state than if he had just torn the roster down to the studs in 2021 or 2022. Because of that, his departure doesn't come as a huge surprise.

His successor will be left to sift through the damage.

The Columbus Blue Jackets hired Mike Babcock as their next head coach in July, but his tenure has come to an end in only two months.

The team announced that Babcock has resigned and is being replaced by Pascal Vincent. As hockey insider Frank Seravalli noted, Babcock was the subject of an investigation by the NHLPA that "left no path" for him to continue as head coach.

"Upon reflection, it has become clear that continuing as head coach of the Columbus Blue Jackets was going to be too much of a distraction," Babcock said in a release. "While I'm disappointed to not have had the opportunity to continue the work we've begun, I know it's in the best interest of the organization for me to step away at this time. I wish everyone in the organization well in the upcoming season."

ESPN's Greg Wyshinski reported Thursday that NHLPA executive director Marty Walsh and assistant executive director Ron Hainsey met with Blue Jackets players to investigate whether Babcock "violated players' privacy when he asked to see photos on their cellphones."

The probe began after former NHL player Paul Bissonette said on Tuesday's episode of the Spittin' Chiclets podcast that Babcock asked Blue Jackets captain Boone Jenner to show him his camera roll and then displayed those photos via AirPlay on his office wall. Columbus forward Johnny Gaudreau also confirmed to ESPN that Babcock asked him to see photos on his phone.

"Enough with putting guys on the spot in the coaches room asking them to link their phones up to AirPlay mode and grilling them. I've had tons of players confirm it," Bissonnette said after the episode was released.

Prior to returning to the NHL to coach the Blue Jackets, Babcock last coached in the league with the Toronto Maple Leafs from 2015 to 2019. He was fired after multiple allegations of mental abuse of players.