Lou Lamoriello Louis " Lou " Lamoriello ( born October 21 , 1942 ) is the CEO , president , and general manager of the New Jersey Devils of the National Hockey League . Lamoriello , who has been with the Devils since 1987 , has served longer than any current GM in the league with a single franchise . He played a key part in negotiating the settlement of the 2004 – 05 NHL lockout . Before the Devils . Prior to joining the Devils , Lou Lamoriello was a math teacher at Johnston ( R . I . ) High School for several years ending in the early 1970s . Lamoriello was the athletic director and men ' s ice hockey coach at Providence College , his alma mater . He coached Providence ' s ice hockey team from 1968 to 1987 , and was named athletic director in 1982 . As athletic director , he hired Rick Pitino as the head coach of the Providence ' s men ' s basketball team . Pitino would go on to take Providence to the Final Four in 1987 . Devils President and General Manager . Lamoriello was appointed as president of the Devils by then - owner John McMullen in April 1987 . Lamoriello named himself general manager just before the start of the next season — a move that surprised many NHL observers . He had never played , coached or managed in the NHL , and was virtually unknown outside the American college hockey community . Since then , Lamoriello has presided over one of the most successful rebuilding projects in North American professional sports history . In his first season as GM , the Devils notched their first winning season in franchise history ( dating back to their time as the Kansas City Scouts [ 1974 – 76 ] and Colorado Rockies [ 1976 – 82 ] ) and reached the Wales Conference finals . They have made the playoffs in all but two of his 20 seasons as GM and appeared in the Stanley Cup finals in 1995 ( won ) , 2000 ( won ) , 2001 ( lost ) and 2003 ( won ) . After YankeeNets bought the Devils in 2000 , Lamoriello was named CEO of the Devils , as well as CEO of the then co - owned New Jersey Nets . He dropped his chairmanship of the Devils and resigned his posts on the Nets after Jeffrey Vanderbeek bought the Devils in 2004 . Both YankeeNets and Vanderbeek have largely left the Devils ' operations in Lamoriello ' s hands . He served as the GM for Team USA in the 1998 Winter Olympics . In 1992 , he was awarded the Lester Patrick Trophy for outstanding service to hockey in the United States . Lamoriello is well - known in NHL circles for his hard - nosed approach to contract negotiations . Pat Verbeek , Kirk Muller and Bill Guerin , among others , have been traded out of town after losing contract negotiations . He nearly traded Ken Daneyko , the Devils ' all - time leader in games played , in 1989 . According to Daneyko , Lamoriello believes in paying a third - line player as much as a first - line player if he feels they have the same value to the team . Brief coaching stints . On December 19 , 2005 , following the surprise resignation of Larry Robinson as Devils head coach , Lamoriello took over the position on an interim basis . The Devils eventually made it the Eastern Conference semi - finals before falling to the Carolina Hurricanes . When asked on television after the Devils ' victory over the New York Rangers in the first round of the playoffs if he was interested in becoming head coach permanently , Lamoriello replied " Absolutely not . " On April 2 , 2007 , Lamoriello once again took over as interim head coach after firing Claude Julien . The firing took place with three games left in the season , when the Devils had the second - best record in the conference and were on their way to setting a franchise record for regular season wins .