It had already been reported that Cassidy didn't take the firing well and was blindsided by the news. Yesterday during a press conference Sweeney had to answer for his choices and at least one reporter wasn't allowing him to go unchecked.
Our Tylee Freckleface: "You referenced McAvoy and Lindholm being injured, you mentioned the war of attrition with injuries, [but] again, I'm sort of having a hard time connecting how that relates to the coach. What can a coach do to prevent these things from happening? It does seem random (as it relates to] the injuries."
Don Sweeney: "What was the connection I made with the injuries?" OTF: "Your point was that that was a big problem with your team this year. How is it on the coach that you lose two key defensemen to injuries? You still pushed to Carolina to Game 7. I'm just trying to connect the dots here in terms of how Cassidy could prevent something like that from happening?"
DS: "I don't think I referenced that Bruce could prevent that from happening. I think I answered the question of some of the things that go into making a decision and why you might not have success, and they're all parts of that. Did you have a more direct question you'd like me to answer?"
OTF: "Well, if you're healthy and beat Carolina, do you think that you're still sitting here today changing coaches? It just seems like that.. the depth is an issue, but I don't know what a coaching change does to fix that."
DS: "Hypothetically, if we had continued on in the playoffs and won the Stanley Cup-no, I'm probably happy about the parade we're on. That's sometimes the margins. The margins you just referenced in the Carolina series were really small, we knew that going in. They were really small. That was a really good hockey team. It would have taken us to execute - I don't think the depth of our lineup shone through 5-on-5 like they had for January, February, March. That's some of the issues that reared their head at an inopportune time. Attrition is part of the exercise, and when you lose those players, that's a difficult thing to overcome, as an organization and a team. That, I did not place on the head coach in terms of why they got injured or how they got injured. Just as I referenced and answered this question, and I'll do my best answer yours."