{"id":569677,"date":"2026-05-08T05:27:37","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T05:27:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/569677\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T05:27:37","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T05:27:37","slug":"islanders-name-new-assistant-coach-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/569677\/","title":{"rendered":"Islanders name new Assistant Coach"},"content":{"rendered":"

Islanders name new Assistant Coach<\/a> originally appeared on The Sporting News<\/a>. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The New York Islanders<\/a> have added Rocky Thompson to their coaching staff.<\/p>\n

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The announcement came in the afternoon of May 5, with the Islanders naming Thompson as\u00a0Assistant Coach. Thompson \u2014 who is 48 \u2014 joins the New York organization after having served\u00a0the past year as Head Coach of the Islanders American Hockey League affiliate in Bridgeport. He led Bridgeport back to the playoffs for the first time since 2021-22, posting a 34-30-8 record.<\/p>\n

He was originally named the HC of the Bridgeport Islanders on June 23, 2025, making him their 10th Head Coach in team history and this being an elevation of roles.<\/p>\n

Prior to his time with the Islanders’ AHL affiliate,\u00a0Thompson spent three seasons as Assistant Coach with the Philadelphia Flyers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Before his time with the Flyers coaching staff, Thompson spent the 2020-21 season as an Associate Coach with the San Jose Sharks<\/a> under then Head Coach Bob Boughner, who is now an Assistant Coach on the Islanders staff, serving as a sort of reunion for the pair.<\/p>\n

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Rock Thompson named assistant coach of New York Islanders<\/p>\n

Thompson was Head Coach in Chicago<\/a>, the Vegas Golden Knights<\/a>\u2019 AHL club, for three seasons (2017-20) \u2014 compiling\u00a0a 113-71-29 record in 213 regular season games with the Wolves, including a 44-22-10 record in 2018-19 en route to the club\u2019s Calder Cup Finals run.<\/p>\n

Thompson was also Head Coach of the Windsor Spitfires (Ontario Hockey League) for two seasons 2015-17, posting a record of 81-40-15 over 136 games. He won a Memorial Cup Championship with the Spitfires in 2017.<\/p>\n

For his own playing career, Thompson is a\u00a0former third-round pick who played 25 NHL games\u00a0between his hometown Calgary Flames<\/a> (1997-99) and the Florida Panthers<\/a> (2000-02). He recorded 69 points (17 goals, 52 assists) and 1,919 penalty minutes in 566 games across his player career \u2014 most of which was spent in the AHL with the\u00a0Saint John Flames, Louisville Panthers, Hershey Bears, San Antonio Rampage, Toronto Roadrunners, Edmonton Roadrunners, and Peoria Rivermen.<\/p>\n

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Per other reports, it appears Ray Bennett and Bob Boughner are to remain with the Islanders coaching staff. As of presstime \u2014 the Islanders have also yet to name a candidate to take over Thompson’s position in Bridgeport.<\/p>\n

The Islanders ended their 2025-26 season\u00a0with a 2-1 loss to the Carolina Hurricanes<\/a> on April 14, and\u00a0missed the playoffs for the second straight season and finished with 91 points and a record of 43-34-5.<\/p>\n

MORE:Rangers’ AHL affiliate shakes up coaching staff, fire head coach<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Islanders name new Assistant Coach originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":567708,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5110],"tags":[2377,6950,2670,8479,26,29,37,6566,57,979,5,122,3328,159,5190,5189,4,56,63736,16930,168,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-569677","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-islanders","8":"tag-assistant-coach","9":"tag-bob-boughner","10":"tag-bridgeport","11":"tag-bridgeport-islanders","12":"tag-calgary-flames","13":"tag-carolina-hurricanes","14":"tag-chicago","15":"tag-coaching-staff","16":"tag-florida-panthers","17":"tag-head-coach","18":"tag-hockey","19":"tag-islanders","20":"tag-new-york","21":"tag-new-york-islanders","22":"tag-newyork","23":"tag-newyorkislanders","24":"tag-nhl","25":"tag-philadelphia-flyers","26":"tag-rock-thompson","27":"tag-rocky-thompson","28":"tag-san-jose-sharks","29":"tag-vegas-golden-knights"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116537304228591461","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569677","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=569677"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569677\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/567708"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=569677"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=569677"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=569677"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}