David Quinn hired as New York Rangers’ head coach: report

Boston University’s David Quinn has been named the new head coach of the New York Rangers, the team announced Wednesday. He replaces Alain Vigneault, who was fired in the spring after filling the role for five seasons.

Quinn, 51, served as head coach at BU, one of college hockey’s premier programs, for the past five seasons. He made the NCAA Tournament the past four seasons and coached the 2014-15 team, led by Jack Eichel, to a loss in the national championship game.

The Rangers and Quinn reportedly agreed to a five-year contract worth $2.4 million per year, which makes Quinn one of the highest-paid coaches in the NHL. CapFriendly has limited data on coach salaries, but only Mike Babcock ($6.25 million), Joel Quenneville ($6 million), Claude Julien ($5 million), Todd McLellan ($3 million) and Bruce Boudreau ($2.625 million) are known to make more. Those are five of the most successful active coaches in the league.

While Quinn has been successful coaching at the college hockey level during his career, he has limited experience coaching at the NHL level. His only previous professional coaching jobs were as head coach of the AHL’s Lake Erie Monsters from 2009-12 and as an assistant with the Avalanche in 2012-13. He joined BU in 2013.

Quinn is the latest prominent college coach to make the leap to the pro ranks in recent years. North Dakota’s Dave Hakstol joined the Flyers three years ago and the Stars nabbed Jim Montgomery from the University of Denver recently. Montgomery had reportedly been a target of the Rangers before they turned attention to Quinn.