Mark Dennehy is going from Massachusetts to upstate New York — with a brief sojourn to West Virginia thrown in for good measure.
Dennehy, a career college coach who guided Merrimack College for 13 years until he was released from that position in March, joined the ECHL’s Wheeling Nailers as head coach in June in his first foray into professional hockey.
Less than two months later, the New Jersey Devils came asking the parent club Pittsburgh Penguins for permission to interview Dennehy — and when it was all over, the former Boston College defenseman had been tabbed as the new bench boss of the American Hockey League’s Binghamton Devils.
It all happened pretty quickly, to say the least.
“It did,” admitted Dennehy, who got back into the coaching swing of things by mentoring the U.S. Under-17 Team at the Five Nations Cup in Slovakia in mid-August.
“I’d like to thank Wheeling, the ownership group, Billy Guerin, Jim Rutherford and the Penguins for giving me the opportunity to talk to New Jersey,” he added. “They didn’t have to.”
