Hitchcock knows how to win, but can he in Columbus?
It doesn't get any more delicious than this.
The Columbus Blue Jackets hire Ken Hitchcock to turn around their misbegotten squad and Hitchcock's first test will be against ... wait for it ... his former team, the Philadelphia Flyers.
You'd have to get an industrial stink-o-meter to determine which of these two teams is worse. But one thing is certain: The Blue Jackets will have the best coach by a country mile when the puck drops Friday night, and that's the best thing that's been said about the Blue Jackets in an awfully long time.
Not that Hitchcock's hiring can realistically be expected to change anything in the short term for a team that has found itself sucked into a quagmire of losing, even with quality players and proven winners such as Adam Foote and Fredrik Modin.
But for the first time since Columbus fired first-ever coach Dave King partway through the team's third season, the Blue Jackets have a man behind the bench who is a commanding presence, a man with a proven track record, a man who's not the GM's buddy and a man who will, quite frankly, kick some butt.
And if ever there was a team that needed to have its collective head handed to it, it's Columbus.
To expect that the Blue Jackets would be a playoff contender might have been a stretch, but a roster that features offensive talent such as Rick Nash, Anson Carter, Sergei Fedorov, Nikolai Zherdev, David Vyborny and Modin should be showing something more than the cadaver-like effort produced on an almost nightly basis thus far.
One top scout told ESPN.com on Wednesday that the Blue Jackets are the perfect example of a team whose sum is far less than the total of its various parts.
All that talent had combined to produce a league-low 2.05 goals per game before Wednesday's game against St. Louis. The Blue Jackets have by far the fewest 5-on-5 goals: just 18, or fewer than one per game. What does that mean? Well, start with a lack of finish, a lack of effort and a lack of scheme, and you're on the right track.
Hitchcock will be expected to provide a framework where all of those things will be in evidence.
Not that there aren't questions surrounding Hitchcock's arrival in Columbus.
The affable native of Edmonton hardly had time to find a pair of pants without Ed Snider's footprints on the bottom, having been given the bum's rush by the Philadelphia owner after the Flyers stumbled to a 1-6-1 start. Almost immediately, Hitchcock was rumored to be heading to Phoenix and Columbus, a nod to his sterling record, which includes a Stanley Cup in Dallas in 1999 and a gold medal in Salt Lake City and a World Cup of Hockey championship, both as an assistant for Team Canada.
But what frame of mind will Hitchcock be in? Surely there's still an element of being shell-shocked, both by the Flyers' unexpected start and his equally unexpected canning.
Those who know Hitchcock know him as a tireless worker. He is a coach's coach, an almost compulsive planner whose life is the task at hand. But when you've been through the ringer as Hitchcock has, first being hammered by the Buffalo Sabres in the first round last spring and then having the wheels come off out of the gate this season, what kind of reservoir of emotion does he have?
And let's not forget, Hitchcock isn't being asked to come in and turn around a Stanley Cup contender. He's being asked to salvage a team that has never been to the playoffs and knows absolutely zero about winning.
When he came to Philadelphia in May 2002, he was asked to take a perennial contender to the top. He couldn't do it, but this is a completely different dynamic that awaits in Ohio.
One thing that bodes well for Hitchcock, the Blue Jackets and their beleaguered fans is that he has been there before.
When he took over the Dallas Stars' reins midway through the 1995-96 season, the team ended up in sixth place in the Central Division with 66 points and no playoff berth. The next season, Hitchcock guided the Stars to first place in the division with 104 points. They lost in the first round of the playoffs, but advanced to the conference finals the next year after a 109-point regular season. The Stars then won it all in 1999 following a 114-point regular season.
Hitchcock knows well the path from obscurity to supremacy. The question is whether he has the willpower or the tools to follow that path once more.
Scott Burnside is the NHL writer for ESPN.com.
