Winnipeg Jets head coach Scott Arniel reflects on his first season as bench boss in Manitoba

The Jets didn’t make waves last summer when former head coach Rick Bowness announced his retirement which was eventually followed by Winnipeg hiring his associate coach Scott Arniel to be the fourth bench boss (technically fifth if you consider Dave Lowry’s role as interim) since the team returned to Manitoba. There was a familiarity with him given he was drafted by the 1.0 Jets in the early 80s, played for and coached the Manitoba Moose and then as referenced spent two more years in Winnipeg as an associate coach.

How did things go in his first year?

The Jets started the season 15-1-0, won the first Presidents’ Trophy in the history of the organization. They set franchise records for wins and points. And Arniel was named a finalist for the Jack Adams Award as coach of the year.

Not too shabby.

Of course they fell short of their Stanley Cup goal bowing out to the Stars in the second round of the playoffs which included not winning a game on the road. Notable that this was the farthest a Jets team had gone (in a traditional season) in the playoffs since 2017-18 when they went to the Western Conference Finals.

During his end of season media avails he was asked to reflect on his first year behind the bench:

“Whirlwind, honestly. It seems like yesterday I was sitting here talking to you guys about how thankful I was about getting a second chance. How fast. It’s gonna get crazier next year with the Olympics but just the schedule certainly built into that. It was an amazing year. First thing I did when the players walked in the room, first thing I did was thank them for helping me in my first year. Every single one of them. Whether you played a gigantic role or whether it was a small part. I was so thankful to the players and my staff, management, ownership for giving me the opportunity. For me, it’s a dream come true to be back doing it. To see the passion, what I saw in the playoffs from our fans. That’s why everyone of us, everyone of these players, we obviously never got a chance to play that Game 7, we knew we would have won it. But at the end of the day for me, this is the start of something that I’m hoping ends with us one day holding that Stanley Cup. That’s why we’re here. That’s what this group wants. We gotta do all the right things to get there. Maybe a month from not we’ll sit back and look at it and talk about the great things that happened but at the end of the day we didn’t win, we’re not playing Edmonton tonight. That’s the one thing that is still gnawing at me a little bit but real proud of our hockey team, real proud of certainly all of the things that went on over the course of the year. Extremely proud of how they handled Game 6. It’s been quite a year for me.”

Lots of gratitude but also plenty of hunger for more from the Jets bench boss.