How sought-after coach David Carle has a unique link to the Maple Leafs

During a recent appearance on the NHL Unscripted podcast, David Carle explained how his successful coaching career got underway.

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Published May 27, 2026  •  3 minute read

Team USA head coach David Carle gestures during the semifinal match at the IIHF world junior championship in 2024. AFP via Getty Images

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If David Carle becomes coach of the Maple Leafs, he won’t have to look far to relay the good news.

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That would be Leafs assistant coach Derek Lalonde, a central figure in Carle’s early coaching days.

Carle recently was a guest on the NHL Unscripted podcast with Adnan Virk, Jason Demers and Nate Thompson, and explained how he initially became a hockey coach.

The bookend now is that the 36-year-old Carle is among the most sought-after young coaches in the game, having won three NCAA titles in the past five seasons with the University of Denver as well as two world junior championship gold medals with the United States.

The most recent speculation has tied Carle to the Colorado Avalanche in the wake of the Avs’ stunning sweep at the hands of the Vegas Golden Knights. If the Avs move on from Jared Bednar, Carle could be the replacement.

The Leafs’ interest in Carle has been known for a while.

Why did Carle’s playing days end?

Carle’s playing career ended after he was diagnosed with a heart condition at the National Hockey League draft combine in 2008. Though the Tampa Bay Lightning drafted him in the seventh round that year out of Shattuck St. Mary’s in Minnesota, Carle, a defenceman, didn’t play again.

With his scholarship intact with the University of Denver, Carle joined the hockey team’s coaching staff for the 2008-09 season as a student assistant. An assistant coach on George Gwozdecky’s staff was Lalonde.

As Carle told it, his role expanded each year and during a practice in his junior year, he had a conversation with Lalonde.

“He said, ‘You’re going to do this full time, right?’ and I said ‘Do what full time?’ And he goes ‘Coach,’” Carle said on the podcast.

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Carle told Lalonde he had hadn’t really thought of it as a career.

“He goes, ‘Well, I think you should consider it, I think you would be really good at it,’” Carle said.

“It’s funny. I think people are put in your life to help you and support you in different ways. I certainly didn’t get through what I went through by myself and accomplish what I’ve done as a coach by myself. That really made me think.”

How did Carle get into coaching full-time?

Lalonde went on to become coach of the Green Bay Gamblers of the United States Hockey League. Going into 2013-14, Lalonde needed an assistant and called Carle.

“He was the guy who offered me my first full-time job in coaching and in hockey,” Carle said. “I went from Denver to Green Bay, was there with him for a year and a half and ultimately ended up back at Denver.

“The story is unique and it has worked out the way it has supposed to and maybe not the way it was planned, but I feel blessed and fortunate to have the opportunities to be able to prove people right and be put in great situations throughout my career.”

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Carle became Denver’s head coach in 2018 and his first championship came in 2022. After coaching in the minors, Lalonde was an assistant in Tampa Bay and the head coach of the Detroit Red Wings prior to being hired by the Leafs last June.

Lalonde remained on the Leafs staff after the firing two weeks ago of Craig Berube and reportedly was on general manager John Chayka’s list to be interviewed for the head vacancy.

Carle said that he and Lalonde talk to each other on a regular basis to this day.

Will there be a reunion between the two in Toronto? We should know soon enough. If so, they won’t require an introduction.

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