Blues' Victory Gives Hitchcock Fourth On NHL Win List

[RealGM Wiretap]

Blues head coach Ken Hitchcock reached an impressive milestone on Thursday night.

Alexander Steen had a goal and two assists to help Hitchcock move into sole possession of fourth place on the NHL wins list in the Blues' 6-3 victory over the Lightning.

"You can't get a lot of wins unless you've got good players," Hitchcock said.

Hitchcock's 693rd regular-season win broke a tie with Dick Irvin. The Blues coach only trails Joel Quenneville (739), Al Arbour (782) and Scotty Bowman (1,244).

Via ESPN.com

[mawbsta]

Some records are untouchable - Took Scotty 30 years on some great teams, won 40+ games 17 times 50 games 8+ times and 60 games twice, never had a losing season and held an impressive .657 career winning percentage.

Next closest coach is 500 wins away? only 20 coaches in the history of the game have 500 wins.
Bowman's record will stand the test of time.

Looking at the contemporaries, If Hitchcock held his current success rate it would take him another 12 years to catch Scotty. Seeing how he is already 63--that ain't gonna happen.

Joel Quenneville is a decade younger (53) and has 47 more wins (740) than Hitchcock but it would still take him 10 years to do it. It's conceivable that he could coach another 10 years and he's in a good position with this Hawks club.

Mike Babcock is 51 and holds the third highest win% of any coach in the top 20 and was the second fastest coach to 500 wins, trailing only Bowman. If anyone is going to pull it off, it's Babcock - unless of course he agrees to coach the Leafs for the next decade.