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.”
Just like that, a coach who was more than three months removed from his previous position, and who hadn’t yet coached his first ECHL game, was on his way to the AHL, one step below the NHL.
“I was excited to go to Wheeling,” said Dennehy. “Pittsburgh is a top-notch organization, and at the end of the day, I’m going from one great organization to another.”
Out of respect for the Penguins, Dennehy ultimately decided to join the Devils after just a few days’ contemplation, so as not to drag things out too long for his temporary employer. He was succeeded in Wheeling by former Boston University forward and assistant coach Mike Bavis, whom Dennehy played against in college.
In Binghamton, Dennehy follows Rick Kowalsky, who was named an assistant in New Jersey in July after eight seasons guiding the Devils’ AHL affiliate. Kowalsky joins New Jersey head coach John Hynes, a BU alumnus who headed the AHL’s Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins in Pittsburgh’s system for five seasons before he took over the NHL Devils in 2015.
“Pittsburgh has done a great job in moving on, with players and coaches,” said Dennehy. “Hynes is an example. It didn’t surprise me, and it’s a first-class operation.”
A native of Dorchester, Mass., Dennehy plied his playing trade for both Boston College High School and Deerfield Academy, captaining both squads before lettering all four years on the blue line at BC. He registered eight goals and 54 points in 133 career college contests, while capably minding his own end. He also helped the Eagles to the 1990 Hockey East championship, plus three consecutive regular-season conference titles and three straight NCAA tournament appearances, before he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in marketing in 1991.
Dennehy and Guerin (Wilbraham, Mass.) were teammates at BC for two seasons and were both members of the 1989-90 Eagles’ group that advanced to the NCAA tournament semifinals. BC fell to eventual national champion Wisconsin by one goal, at Joe Louis Arena in Detroit, before Wisconsin went on to best Colgate for the crown.
It was Guerin, Pittsburgh’s assistant general manager, who reached out to his fellow BC alumnus to bring Dennehy to Wheeling. According to Guerin, who won Stanley Cups with both the Devils and Penguins during an 18-year NHL playing career that saw him score 468 total goals, hiring his former college teammate was an easy choice to make.
“The relationship between the Penguins and the Wheeling Nailers is critical,” said Guerin to The Intelligencer in Wheeling upon hiring Dennehy to coach the Nailers. “When Mark’s name came up and the opportunity to possibly hire him was there, it was a no-brainer.”
Guerin and the Penguins then permitted New Jersey to interview Dennehy, despite the fact that he had just come aboard in Wheeling, and ultimately let him go.
“Billy is a good friend,” said Dennehy. “I can’t thank him enough for how he treated me, and I wasn’t surprised at all (that he let me move on).”
After graduating from BC, Dennehy played professionally for one year with the Ayr Raiders in Scotland, where he tallied 57 points in 34 outings. He then returned stateside and underwent a tryout with the Fort Wayne Komets, then of the International Hockey League, in 1992 before deciding to hang up his competitive skates.
Dennehy later began his coaching career at the University of Massachusetts, where he assisted his former BC assistant coach, Joe Mallen. He then moved on to Princeton University as an assistant for two seasons, where he helped the Tigers win the 1998 ECAC championship and earn their first-ever NCAA tournament berth.
After Princeton, Dennehy earned his first head coaching job, at Fairfield University, where he led the Stags’ now-defunct NCAA Division 1 program for a single season.
“It looked like a stopover, but those nine months of head coaching experience were invaluable,” he had said previously.
Dennehy then went back to UMass for four seasons as an assistant, and one year as an associate, under his former Princeton head coach Don “Toot” Cahoon, before he took the reins at Merrimack in 2005 and proceeded to revive a moribund program.
“We originally set our sights low,” he recalled in 2011. “It was, ‘Let’s make the playoffs.’ ”
Dennehy went 156-222-56 overall over 13 seasons in North Andover. His tenure with the Warriors included a No. 1 national ranking, plus the second-ever NCAA Division 1 tournament berth in school history, which came in 2011 after Merrimack notched 25 overall victories and also played in the Hockey East championship game that season. That success came one year after he shared Hockey East Coach of the Year accolades with the now-retired Dick Umile (Melrose, Mass.) of New Hampshire.
Dennehy also guided Merrimack to six seasons of 15 or more total wins, twice earned New England Coach of the Year honors, and turned out a number of pro players, the most notable of which was perhaps Stephane Da Costa. The Paris, France, native skated in parts of four seasons with the Ottawa Senators and has spent the last four years playing in Europe, including three years in Russia in the Kontinental Hockey League.
“I was a college coach for 24 years,” said Dennehy. “It was about developing players as students, athletes and people.”
He’ll still be developing players, despite moving on up to the professional ranks, and was working to recruit former college skaters from both the NCAA Division 1 and Division 3 levels to Wheeling when he got the call from Binghamton.
“ECHL or AHL, the mandate doesn’t change,” he added. “We’re in charge of New Jersey’s assets. Hopefully (assistant coach) Sergei (Brylin) and I will meet those goals, to have players learn the Devil way, and get called up.”
Dennehy also said that everything in New Jersey’s organization trickles down from GM Ray Shero, assistant GM Tom Fitzgerald, and Hynes, who led the Devils back to the Stanley Cup playoffs this spring for the first time since 2012.
“They’ve done a great job of developing a culture, and it’s really an outstanding organization,” said Dennehy. “I look forward to taking my lead from them on how we want to play, and they’ve also done a great job drafting players to play in their plan.”
The Devils feel much the same about Dennehy and his extensive résumé.
“Mark has spent considerable time building, coaching and recruiting in one of college hockey’s most competitive conferences,” said Fitzgerald to NHL.com after Dennehy was hired to coach Binghamton. “His experience will help him connect with players coming from the collegiate and junior hockey levels. Mark is extremely excited for a new challenge and to take the next step in his coaching career.”
Merrimack finished 12-21-4 overall in 2017-18, and won at then-defending NCAA champion Denver during the regular season before ultimately falling to BC in the first round of the Hockey East postseason tournament, in a pair of one-goal games. Dennehy was released from his coaching position shortly afterward, despite having earned an extension in February 2017.
“I left Merrimack with my head and chest out,” said Dennehy. “The hockey world knows what we were able to do there. My tenure prepared me for this opportunity, and I’m proud of the job we did.”
Those accomplishments, in addition to on-ice success, included garnering $3 million worth of renovations to Merrimack’s 2,549-seat Lawler Arena.
Dennehy will have at least one familiar face on his Binghamton roster to start the 2018-19 season. Former Merrimack forward Brett Seney, who led the Warriors in scoring in all four of his college campaigns, turned pro at the end of last season and played in 12 AHL games with the B-Devils. He was drafted by New Jersey in the sixth round (157th overall) in 2015, following his freshman year with the Warriors.
“He texted me when he heard the news (of my hiring),” said Dennehy. “He was pretty excited, and of course he wants to play in the NHL. My job is to prepare him, Joey Anderson and others to get called up and understand how New Jersey plays and operates.”
Unlike in college, Dennehy won’t have to function as a recruiter at the AHL level and will instead be able to focus on coaching and development.
“I’m in good hands with Tom Fitzgerald and the scouting staff,” he said. “I learned a lot in the two months I was in Wheeling, about the salary cap and signing guys, and I wouldn’t say I’ll miss recruiting.”
Dennehy, who has three hockey-playing daughters with his wife, Heather, said that, in the end, moving from Wheeling and the ECHL, to Binghamton and the AHL, isn’t a quantum leap.
“It’s not as big a change,” he said, of going from hockey’s “AA” level to its “AAA” stage.
“If anything, I’m closer to home,” he pointed out. “I’ll embed myself in coaching and the community, and I’m looking forward to getting after it.”
