Knights coach makes pitch for pal Belichick to join Raiders

Golden Knights coach Bruce Cassidy opened his postgame news conference Thursday night by acknowledging the end of Bill Belichick’s legendary run as coach of the New England Patriots.

Then he made a pitch for his old friend to join him in Las Vegas.

“There is an opening in Vegas,” Cassidy said, referring to the Raiders’ coaching search. “I love the job (interim coach Antonio Pierce) did, but I’m just throwing it out there.”

Cassidy made the comments after his team secured a 2-1 overtime victory over Boston, where he served as coach from 2016 through 2022.

It was during that time he became friends with Belichick, who was in the midst of a legendary run with New England.

The first question posed to Cassidy was about the brief absences of two of his star players Thursday, Jack Eichel and Mark Stone, who both left in the second period only to return to action and contribute to the win.

Cassidy apologized to the reporter, saying he had something he wanted to address before delving into the topic of his own team.

“I wanted to tip my hat to Bill Belichick for a great tenure in New England,” he said. “I know we’re not the New England area, but he’s a friend of mine and I heard the news today, so congrats to Bill on an outstanding run. I wish you all the best going forward.”

He wasn’t done with the subject. Several Boston-based media members entered the room later in the news conference, and one of them asked Cassidy directly about Belichick.

That’s when he decided to make the pitch for his pal to join him in the desert, but not before sharing some of what he had learned about coaching from Belichick over the years.

“We talked at length before the Stanley Cup Final against St. Louis, not about individual players but the details of the game and the grind of the game and coaching through those,” Cassidy said. “We’re going through one now. So it was a lot about not beating yourself.”

Cassidy remembers Belichick waxing poetic about the line of scrimmage and taking care of the ball, which the hockey coach interpreted as puck management.

“Obviously, there’s more turnovers in hockey because of the back-and-forth nature of the game, but making good decisions,” Cassidy said. “Those were a lot of the conversations we had. How do you coach those things into players because they’re not fun to coach? It’s not, ‘Hey, let’s throw a long bomb.’ It’s just doing your job, as the T-shirts are so famously known in New England.”

Part of why Cassidy said he grew so fond of Belichick is that despite all of his success, he was always willing to share his knowledge with Cassidy even when he was still pretty new to the game.

“I took a lot from him,” Cassidy said. “He was good to me as a young coach there. Our relationship grew over the years as I got to know him better, and I had a long tenure there. So I wish him all the best wherever he lands.”

Which Cassidy hopes could be Las Vegas.

Belichick said during his Thursday news conference that he does plan to continue coaching. Several teams are believed to be interested.

The Raiders are in the midst of a coaching search with Pierce considered a strong candidate to retain the job on a full-time basis.

Belichick has 302 career regular-season wins, just 26 behind Don Shula’s all-time record. Belichick is the winningest postseason coach in history with 31 victories, putting him just 14 behind Shula’s overall total.

One potential issue with Belichick to the Raiders is his close association with Josh McDaniels, who was fired by the organization at midseason. There is speculation that Belichick could once again hire McDaniels as his offensive coordinator, which could create an awkward situation in the locker room.

Contact Adam Hill at ahill@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AdamHillLVRJ on X.