Preds coach Andrew Brunette lost his job the last time he was in line for the Adams Award.

-- Photo By George Walker Iv | Ap

Predators coach Andrew Brunette hopes history doesn’t repeat itself, at least when it comes to being named by the NHL as a finalist for the Jack Adams Award, given annually to the league’s coach of the year.

This is the second time Brunette has been named a finalist, the previous one coming in 2022 when Brunette served as the interim head coach of the Florida Panthers.

The Jack Adams Award is voted on by members of the NHL’s Broadcasters’ Association.

This year’s finalists, including Vancouver’s Rick Tocchet and Winnipeg’s Rick Bowness, were announced the morning of Game 6 of Nashville and Vancouver’s playoff series.

The announcement marked the first time since 2012 two Jack Adams Award finalists’ teams faced each other during the playoffs. Vancouver won the game 1-0 and the series 4-2.

During his morning media availability before Game 6, Brunette took the opportunity to inject a little levity into an obviously tense day where his team was facing elimination from the playoffs.

“Obviously, a tremendous honor,” he says. “Last time it didn’t go quite as well. I think I lost my job a little while later. I don’t know how to take it anymore.”

Early in the 2021-22 season, Brunette was named interim head coach of the Panthers following the resignation of Joel Quenneville, who stepped aside due to allegations of abuse that occurred within the Chicago Blackhawks organization during his tenure as head coach.

In his one season as the interim head coach with Florida, Brunette’s Panthers put up an impressive 51-18-6 record. After defeating the Washington Capitals in the first round of that season’s playoffs, they were then swept in the second round by their in-state rival Tampa Bay Lightning. Calgary’s Darry Sutter won the award that year, with Brunette finishing second.

After that season, Florida hired Paul Maurice as its new head coach, spelling the end of Brunette’s short, but successful, tenure behind the bench.

Despite bringing up the fact that he was unemployed shortly after his first Jack Adams nomination, Brunette should feel fairly confident that his job in Nashville is secure after the performance his team turned in during the 2023-24 season.

Coming into this season, expectations for the Predators were not high. After missing the playoffs the previous season, new general manager Barry Trotz dismissed previous bench boss John Hynes and hired Brunette, who played for Trotz in Nashville’s inaugural NHL season in 1998-99.

As a coach, Trotz is third in all-time victories and won one Stanley Cup as well. During his coaching career, Trotz won the Jack Adams Award twice and was named a finalist on two other occasions.

In addition to a coaching change, Trotz also made several eye-opening roster changes in the offseason, jettisoning veterans Matt Duchene and Ryan Johansen and bringing in character players like Ryan O’Reilly, Gustav Nyquist and Luke Schenn.

With the Predators, Brunette implemented a new system, one that took some adjustments for the players. They were slow coming out of the gate, with a record of just 5-10-0 in their first 15 games. Stabilizing after that, the Predators were still on the outside of the playoff picture until a magical six-week stretch that saw the team go 16-0-2 in an 18-game streak of games going undefeated in regulation time.

That streak was immediately preceded by a 9-2 blowout home loss to the Dallas Stars that was so embarrassing, Trotz and Brunette changed the team’s plans to fly to Las Vegas early to see U2 at the Sphere.

The run that followed that humiliating loss can be accredited to Brunette holding the team together when things could have gone south for the Predators. The 18-game streak firmly established the Predators as a playoff team and one that proved many of their doubters wrong.

When they take the ice to start next season, the presumably Brunette-led Predators will not sneak up on as many people as the expectations that are high within Nashville and especially the Predators’ organization, will be raised around the league to see if the Predators can return to the postseason and advance even further.