The Toronto Maple Leafs announced today that Jim Hiller has been hired as the club’s head coach, making him the 41st head coach in franchise history since the team’s founding in 1917.
Hiller arrives with recent NHL head-coaching experience in Los Angeles, where he led the Kings from 2023-24 through 2025-26 and posted a 93-58-24 record — a.600 win percentage across 175 games. He also spent two seasons as an assistant coach with the Kings before taking the top job, and previously served as an NHL assistant with the New York Islanders and with Toronto from 2015-16 to 2018-19.
Those earlier seasons on the Maple Leafs’ staff were not merely a footnote: during Hiller’s four years in Toronto the club qualified for the Stanley Cup Playoffs on three occasions. That inside experience, plus his recent winning record in Los Angeles, are central to why the Maple Leafs’ front office selected him now.
Before the NHL, Hiller built a résumé in junior hockey across 11 seasons in the WHL and BCHL. His five-year run with the Tri-City Americans from 2009-10 to 2013-14 included two division titles, five consecutive playoff berths and a standout 2011-12 campaign in which Tri-City went 50-18-2-2 for 104 points; Hiller was named both Canadian Hockey League Coach of the Year and Western Hockey League Coach of the Year that season. He also served as an assistant coach for Canada at the 2010 Ivan Hlinka Memorial Tournament, where Canada won gold.
General manager John Chayka said the club believes Hiller understands what it takes to win in today’s NHL, connects well with players and brings a clear approach behind the bench. Hiller, a native of Port Alberni, British Columbia who was drafted by the Los Angeles Kings in the 10th round, 207th overall, of the 1989 NHL Draft and went on to play 63 NHL games, said he was excited to return to Toronto and is looking forward to getting to work with the team’s players and staff.
The hire follows reporting earlier Tuesday that the Maple Leafs’ coaching search had entered its final phases; that earlier report listed several names linked to the vacancy as the club narrowed its options. The timing created a narrow window between public signaling that a decision was imminent and the club’s formal announcement of Hiller’s hiring later the same day.
The most immediate, practical consequence is that Toronto now has a permanent bench boss whose résumé combines recent NHL success, previous time in the Maple Leafs’ dressing room and a long track record of developing players at the junior level. What the club has not yet disclosed is when Hiller will formally assume his duties behind the bench and who will join him on his coaching staff — questions that affect how training camp and the offseason program will be run.
Those are the clearest unanswered items: the organization must now set a start date and fill out the staff that will work day-to-day with the roster. How quickly the Maple Leafs move to name assistants and outline Hiller’s timeline will determine whether this hire produces immediate changes to systems and personnel or serves as a steadier continuation of the approach the team has followed in recent seasons.
