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With his balding head, pleasant chubby smile, off-the-cuff humor and a wardrobe that won't exactly land him in Vogue, Bruce Boudreau looks more like the neighborhood butcher than a hockey coach.
On the other hand, check out John Stevens. Nice suit. Nice hair. Measured words, at least in public. A good bet to win a foot race between the two.
"I'm not going out and getting a toupee," Boudreau said Wednesday with a laugh and a shrug. "And the weight's not coming off quite the way I like it to. That's who I am."
Looks can be deceiving. Although they will never pass for identical twins, the coaches commanding the benches in Friday's Game 1 between the Washington Capitals (web|news) and Philadelphia Flyers actually have quite a bit in common.
Both toiled for years in the minor leagues, winning championships a year apart in the American Hockey League, before getting the sudden, midseason promotion to first-time NHL head coach to help rescue a struggling team. Promoted from the Philadelphia Phantoms, Stevens had spent all of eight games as an assistant with the Flyers when he replaced Ken Hitchcock early last season, and Boudreau was still with Hershey of the AHL when the Capitals told him to drive to D.C. and take over for Glen Hanlon in November.
Now they are coaching in the NHL playoffs for the first time, with their players praising their styles as a liberating change of pace from what they had before.
The Flyers won seven of their last nine to snag the No. 6 seed in the Eastern Conference, a remarkable turnaround one year after the worst season in franchise history.
The Capitals finished with seven straight wins to capture the Southeast Division crown after three straight last-place finishes, a surge that has Boudreau getting mentions as a candidate for coach of the year.
Whether he could stand all the attention that comes along with it is another matter.
"This is way too much exposure for a guy that looks like me," the 53-year-old Boudreau said Monday to the unusually large contingent of reporters that gathered for the Capitals' first playoff practice. "I just want to quietly sit in the background."
Stevens, 41, is cut from a similar cloth. On the day he agreed to a contract extension in December, he said: "I never like any conversation about me, so it's uncomfortable for me."
But the Stanley Cup playoffs is no place to hide, so, whether they like it or not, the mannerisms of both coaches are up for full discussion this week.
The Flyers on Stevens: usually mild-mannered, though there are flashes of a short temper behind closed doors. Much more of a players' coach than the relentlessly demanding and sometimes stubborn Hitchcock.
"The thing with John is he's very calm," Flyers center Danny Briere said. "He's got the confidence that he knows what he's doing, he knows where he's going. When things aren't going the way they're supposed to go, he'll step up and bring everybody back in line. When things are good, he can be very good for the players as well."
The Capitals on Boudreau: upbeat, demanding and liberating, a breath of fresh air after a Hanlon system that stifled creativity.
"The best word that I've come up with over the last month and a half to describe this group of players is 'uninhibited'," said left wing Matt Cooke, who joined the Capitals at the trade deadline. "They don't know any different. And that's such a great way to be. Bruce instills confidence in the guys."
Although they coached against each other in the minors and now in the NHL - Boudreau's first Capitals game, in fact, was a 4-3 overtime win over Stevens' Flyers on Nov. 23 - the two don't know each other personally.
"The stories are similar," said Boudreau, who like Stevens, is coaching many of the same players in the NHL that he had in the minors. "It goes to show how important the minor league system is. It also goes to show if someone has faith in the guys that are coaching down there, that they could come up and do a pretty adequate job."
Stevens was returning home from his son's hockey game when he got the call that he was being promoted to the Flyers head coaching job. Boudreau was sleeping at home in Hershey when the Capitals phoned on Thanksgiving morning. He's spent the past 4½ months trying to juggle coaching and fatherhood in two cities.
On Wednesday, Boudreau skated back onto the rink after practice to take some slap shots at his 9-year-old goaltender son, Brady. Two days earlier, he had turned down a chance to participate in a pregame ceremony at the Washington Nationals game so that he could drive back to Hershey and watch Brady try out for a team.
"I've got to come and see it," Boudreau said. "It's more important to me. ... I feel like I've been a rotten father, back and forth." Notes: With four Russians on the roster, the Capitals are drawing more than the usual share of media interest in Moscow. Russian reporters informed Alex Ovechkin that fans back home will be getting up at 3 a.m. to watch Friday's game. "I know everybody will be screaming and drinking beer and watch the game," Ovechkin said. Sergei Fedorov, Alexander Semin and Viktor Kozlov are the other Russian Capitals. ... Boudreau said D Shaone Morrisonn (upper body injury) and D Jeff Schultz (undisclosed injury) are "still day to day" but indicated both would play Friday. "It's more aches and pains than anything," the coach said. "I'm not really too concerned."
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By JOSEPH WHITE AP Sports Writer
AP Sports Writer Dan Gelston in Voorhees, N.J., contributed to this report.
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