Sullivan, 50, was hired on Thursday as an assistant coach with the Leafs AHL affiliate Toronto Marlies. Sullivan played in 1,011 NHL games during his career with the New Jersey Devils, Leafs, Chicago Blackhawks, Nashville Predators, Pittsburgh Penguins and Phoenix Coyotes, scoring 290 goals and amassing 747 points.
The Leafs somewhat controversially waived Sullivan not long after a career year and a role in the club's 1999 ride to the conference final, when then coach/GM Pat Quinn dropped him, only to see Sullivan top the 60-point mark in four straight seasons in Chicago, and two more times with Nashville. After missing all or parts of three seasons with a back injury, Sullivan returned and won the 2009 Bill Masterton Trophy for perseverance.
Sullivan joins the Leafs organization after his stint as assistant GM of the Arizona Coyotes from 2017 to 2021, where he met then vice-president of hockey operations for the Coyotes and now GM of the Leafs, Brad Treliving.
Sullivan was part of the package Toronto received from New Jersey in the Doug Gilmour-Dave Ellett trade. The Timmins native was a ninth-round pick and won a Calder Cup with the Albany River Rats in 1995.
Like the Maple Leafs, the Marlies bowed out in the first round of the AHL playoffs last spring, falling to the Belleville Senators.
