Indeed, Bowness has been behind NHL benches for 2,000-plus games over more than 25 years, almost a quarter of those games as a head coach; Richards has more than 400 games of experience as an NHL head coach.
When he does settle back into his NHL work, with a combined 309 regular-season and Stanley Cup Playoff games as Tampa's coach, Cooper has a brilliant core to continue the Lightning's pursuit of the Stanley Cup; they lost in six games to the Chicago Blackhawks in the 2015 Cup Final and in seven games to the eventual champion Pittsburgh Penguins in the Eastern Conference Final last season.
Among those returning after a busy offseason in Tampa are: captain Steven Stamkos, who signed an eight-year contract to remain in Tampa; cornerstone defenseman Victor Hedman, who agreed to an eight-year extension; forward Alex Killorn, who re-signed for seven years; and goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy, who agreed to a three-year extension.
"Our standards and expectations have been set already," Cooper said. "Guys know what they expect. We had a big summer with Stamkos and Hedman and Killorn re-signing. The band's back together, and that's just how we wanted it. It's upward and onward from here."
Cooper said "there's definitely a comfort level" for him that comes with those players seeing enough potential in the Lightning to buy in with long-term contracts.
"Not only are some of the best players in the world signing back with our team, they're committed just the way ownership, management, coaches and now players are committed for the common goal," he said. "That's what you want. We've been together long enough that guys had decisions to make and they could have gone elsewhere. But they didn't. They chose to stay, and that makes you pretty happy as a coach."
