Insider reveals real reason Bruce Cassidy was fired with 8 games left in the season.

The Vegas Golden Knights shocked the entire National Hockey League on Sunday when they made the move to fire highly respected head coach Bruce Cassidy. It was a stunning move that came at a time when the Golden Knights poor play has put them in real danger of missing the Stanley Cup playoffs, but it is a move that may have been a long time coming.

On Monday, National Hockey League insider Elliotte Friedman shared some additional details about Cassidy's sudden departure, painting a picture that suggests Cassidy's own players may have played a role in him being fired.

"Behind the scenes he is tough," said Friedman on the 32 Thoughts podcast. "If you look at Vegas they have had assistant coaches leave before because he can be a hard guy to work for. We know now that in Boston and Vegas there have been players he's battled with behind the scenes, he's a tough hard demanding guy."

The most interesting part of Friedman's comments however was the revelation that Cassidy may have been feuding with his players the entire time.

"I had a player say to me tonight, he texted me, and he said back in 2023, even when Vegas won the Stanley Cup, he was having battles with some of his players," said Friedman

It sounds like the catalyst for yesterday's move may have actually come almost a year earlier.

"Edmonton beats them in the 2nd round last year in 5 games and it was a very disappointing series for the Golden Knights," said Friedman. "And I just heard... between games 4 and 5, there was a really hard meeting or a really hard series of meetings between Cassidy and some of the players and the players didn't like what was said."

It sounds like that stuck with some of the players who mentioned it during their exit meetings.

"At the exit meetings some players were pretty blunt about how they felt about what was said to them," revealed Friedman. "Kelly McCrimmon backed his coach who he won a Stanley Cup with and he came back this year."

That decision may have proved to be the wrong one, with the players checked out on Cassidy after previous incidents over the years.

" I just think that it really sounds like the message wasn't getting through anymore."

The Golden Knights certainly haven't brought in a man that will be any easier on the players, with John Tortorella having a fiesty reputation of his own, and only time will tell if the coaching swap pays off for Vegas this season.