Ex-Florida Panthers coach arrested in Boca Raton for driving a golf cart. The charge: DUI
Nine months after being an NHL Coach of the Year finalist, coaching the Florida Panthers to their best regular season ever and first playoff series win in 26 years, Andrew Brunette woke up in Broward County Main Jail during NHL All-Star Game Week.
The charge, according to online jail records, is driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol. Brunette, 49, also got two tickets for disobeying stop or yield signs from a deputy out of BSO’s Deerfield Beach office after a golf cart chase over the Broward/Palm Beach county line into Boca Raton. Brunette was posting $500 bond by Wednesday afternoon.
A Deerfield Beach to Boca Raton golf cart ride
The NHL All-Star Game is Saturday at FLA Live Arena, the climax to a week of events from Fort Lauderdale’s beach to Sunrise. An arrest form said Brunette was several miles north, at 249 NE 21st Ave. in Deerfield Beach, the address of Kahuna Bar & Grill.
In Wednesday’s first minutes, the arrest report said, Brunette’s golf cart drew a parking ticket. The BSO deputy writing out the ticket noticed Brunette’s “slurred speech” and “unsteadiness on his feet” while accepting the citation. He said he heard Brunette’s wife tell him not to drive “because the police were still there.”
About 17 minutes later, the deputy wrote he saw Brunette get in the golf cart and run Northeast 20th Avenue stop signs at Northeast Fourth Court and Northeast Seventh Street. After a traffic stop in the 3000 block of Banyan Road, about a mile south of Brunette’s house, the deputy noticed Brunette’s “bloodshot eyes” and “strong odor of alcoholic beverages.”
Brunette “repeated several times that he just wanted to go home,” but he couldn’t repeat the “Walk & Turn” roadside sobriety test. The arrest form said Brunette began to “walk off again, requesting his attorney.”
That’s when, according to the report, Brunette handcuffed. The deputies said he refused to take a breath test.
Success, then passed over by the Panthers
Brunette moved from Panthers assistant coach to interim head coach early in the 2021-22 season after Joel Quenneville resigned as details emerged about sexual abuse that occurred while Quenneville coached the Chicago Blackhawks. Fueled by the best NHL offense of the last 25 years, the Panthers went on to win the President’s Trophy (NHL’s best regular season record) and get their first playoff series win since the 1996 “Year of the Rat.”
But, after the Panthers got swept in the playoffs’ second round by two-time defending Stanley Cup champion Tampa Bay, the Panthers gave Paul Maurice his fourth head coaching job.
After being passed over, Brunette left to be an associate coach with the New Jersey Devils under Lindy Ruff, whose NHL coaching career began as a Panthers assistant coach during the franchise’s first four seasons.
