Derek Clancey of St. John’s, who has ascended higher in professional hockey’s front offices than any other Newfoundlander, continues to climb the Pittsburgh Penguins’ corporate ladder.
The Penguins announced this week Clancey has been promoted to director of player personnel. He was previously the team’s pro scouting director for nine years and before that spent three seasons as a pro scout.
He is entering his 13th year in the Pittsburgh organization.
Clancey has three Stanley Cup rings following Penguins championships in 2009, 2016 and ’17.
He will still be doing some pro scouting, but his attention now, with an emphasis on evaluation, will be focused on players in the Pittsburgh organization.
“And I’ll be chasing free agents in Europe,” he said.
Routinely taking in more than 200 hockey games per season, Clancey will likely be spending less time on the road this season, and more time in Pittsburgh and Wilkes-Barre/Scranton, Pa., home to the American Hockey League’s Penguins.
“I’m looking forward to it,” he said. “It adds a new freshness to the job.”
The 50-year-old Newfoundland and Labrador Hockey Hall of Famer was a Canadian intercollegiate all-star player at UPEI, winning a scoring title and MVP honours during his time with the Panthers following a brilliant high school and junior ‘B’ career in his hometown.
After graduating from P.E.I., Clancey turned pro and spent seven seasons in the ECHL, where he retired amongst the league’s all-time point-getters.
Clancey's last year on the ice was 1998-99, when he was a player-assistant coach for the ECHL's Chesapeake Icebreakers. The following year, he took over the Jackson Bandits and remained in Mississippi for four years as head coach.
From there it was two more years in the ECHL with the Reading, Pa. Royals, and then came a big break: an assistant's job to Jim Hughes — the same Jim Hughes who is the father of 2019 No. 1 overall NHL draft pick Jack Hughes — on the AHL's Manchester Monarchs.
The Monarchs lost in the first round of the 2005-06 playoffs, and the parent club, the Los Angeles Kings, failed to make the Stanley Cup playoffs.
That prompted the firing of long-time L.A. general manager Dave Taylor.
The new GM brought in, Dean Lombardi, elected to clean house, and that meant the firing of Hughes and Clancey in Manchester.
Shortly before the 2006-07 season, Clancey got a call from fellow Maritimer and hockey lifer Don MacAdam, now a St. John’s resident.
MacAdam, from P.E.I., was looking for some help behind the bench of the ECHL’s Dayton Bombers.
Clancey accepted, and between them MacAdam and Clancey helped pilot the Bombers to the ECHL’s Kelly Cup final before losing to the Idaho Steelheads.
That summer, Clancey was weighing his options — return to Toledo, or look for something else. It was then he received a call from Pittsburgh Penguins chief scout Dan McKinnon.
The two had met years before, when McKinnon was scouting Clancey's goalie in Jackson. McKinnon was calling to offer Clancey a scouting post.
That was a dozen years ago.
As director of player personnel, Clancey will, along with new pro scouting director Ryan Bowness, be a trusted lieutenant for Pens executive vice president and general manager Jim Rutherford.
Other appointments in Pittsburgh this week saw Erik Heasley promoted to assistant general manager in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton, while continuing on as manager of the Penguins’ hockey operations. Former star Penguin Kevin Stevens will continue as a special assignment scout, and has been promoted to pro scouting, joining newly-hired pro scouts Jay McClement and Duane Sutter.
Al Santilli joins Colin Alexander as a global crossover scout.
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