PHILADELPHIA — Tick, tick, boom, the Flyers got their guy on Wednesday.

Rick Tocchet, 61, was hired as the 25th head coach (including interims) in Flyers history, the Flyers announced Wednesday. Before John Tortorella was fired on March 27, several reports indicated that Tocchet was high on the team’s short list of coaching candidates if they made a change.

Why was Tocchet on the short list of not just the Flyers but reportedly a leading candidate in Boston, Seattle and Pittsburgh? Since hanging up his skates, he has built a strong resumé and gained experience as an assistant coach and bench boss, most recently over the past 2 1/2 seasons with the Vancouver Canucks, with whom he won the Jack Adams Award as the NHL’s top coach in 2023-24. He also brings three Stanley Cup rings with the Pittsburgh Penguins, one as a player and two as an assistant coach under Mike Sullivan.

And he knows all about Flyers hockey.

“The Philadelphia Flyers have a reputation for being hardworking and hard to play against,” said Tony Granato, who had Tocchet as an assistant in Colorado.

“Torts tried to instill that there, and made a good push to bring back that style of play, or that reputation of what the Flyers are. Rick Tocchet lived it. He was one of the perfect examples of what that was. He’s the same way behind the bench, and he expects the same of his players.”

The Ontario native has amassed a 286-265-87 record across three teams as a head coach (.516 points percentage). His teams have qualified for the playoffs just twice in nine years as a head coach, although he inherited losing teams in the middle of the season on two occasions and took on a significant rebuild in Arizona. With Vancouver, Tocchet was 108-65-27 (.608 points percentage), and led the Canucks to within one game of reaching the Western Conference finals in 2023-24.

A member of the Flyers Hall of Fame, Tocchet played 621 of his 1,144 NHL games with the Orange and Black, accumulating 508 points and a franchise-record 1,815 penalty minutes across two stints. Now he’ll go from sitting on the bench at the building known as the Wells Fargo Center (soon-to-be the Xfinity Mobile Arena) to running it.

“A big part of my blood is the Flyers. The city, I have a lot of huge memories there. I’ve lived most of my adult life there,” Tocchet said in 2023. “The way the Flyers treated me really helped me. I thought obviously, the brand, the [Ed] Snider brand, was incredible to me. So I have, obviously, a soft spot for the organization, just the way they do things.

“And, it actually gives me pride the way that Keith Jones has gone in there, and he’s bringing back that family atmosphere again. It’s fun to see what they’re doing right now.”

Although he may come across as a Tortorella retread, thanks to the right winger‘s hard-nosed style during his playing days, he is not. Yes, Tocchet is demanding like Tortorella, and expects his players to come prepared, but his demeanor and messaging are different.

“He’s always been a great communicator, and he was when he was on the coaching staff,” said Wes Walz, who was an assistant on Tocchet’s staff in Tampa Bay. “... And the one thing I‘ll say about Rick is he’s open to listening. As hard and as tough as he is mentally, and was as a player, he wants assistant coaches around him, and he wants people around him who are not yes guys. He loves ideas. He loves people who think outside the box.”

Added Granato: “As a coach, you’ve got to feel what your team is in need of. Being calm when your team needs somebody behind you to get you going and kind of wake you up, if you need to wake up, you have to read and understand what the team is in need of. And I think Tocc has the ability to do both.”

The Flyers are moving forward in their rebuild, stepping into Year 3 under general manager Danny Brière and president Keith Jones. There is no denying credit goes to Tortorella for laying a strong foundation and culture inside the dressing room. But now is the time to start creating the home on top of that base.

Up and down the Flyers roster are young players trying to develop their games, whether it be Bobby Brink and Emil Andrae, a rising star in Matvei Michkov, or established top-of-the-lineup players in Travis Konecny and Travis Sanheim.

Tocchet brings extensive experience working with forwards, players trying to find their footing, and superstars, and has a reputation for running top-tier power plays. He has coached names like Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin in Pittsburgh, Martin St. Louis and Steven Stamkos in Tampa Bay, Joe Sakic and Peter Forsberg in Colorado, and just helped Vancouver’s Quinn Hughes win a Norris Trophy as the NHL’s top defenseman.

“He’s an amazing coach,” Hughes, the Canucks captain, told Sportsnet in April. “You look at me individually and my game, he’s been amazing for me — amazing for a lot of guys. He’s just a great person, first of all. That’s a guy you want to compete for, you want to play for. And he’s a terrific coach."

But he’s also a guy known to stay on the ice to try and squeeze the most out of players regardless of their slot in the lineup. Walz told The Philadelphia Inquirer about the impact Tocchet had on former Flyers draft pick Steve Downie in Tampa. Downie had nine goals in his first 61 NHL games, before exploding for 22 under Tocchet’s close eye in 2009-10.

Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither will the Flyers be despite bringing Tocchet into the fold. However, he will do just fine.

“Tocc’s a worker, Tocc’s a grinder, Tocc’s a guy that’s going to be there early in the morning,” Granato told The Inquirer. “He’s going to be working on the ice, early with players. He’s going to be there until the wee hours and whatever, just to help and be ready and prepare.”

The puck doesn’t drop on the 2025-26 season until October, but the work starts now.

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