Elisha Lerner

Elisha Lerner

Tall, stern, and with a prominent scar on his right cheek, Guy Boucher looks like the prototypical hockey coach. He speaks in short, to-the-point sentences, yells at his players and uses phrases like “all piss and vinegar”—things you could only hear in a hockey dressing room. Behind the veneer, however, is a McGill graduate with both an Arts degree in history and environmental biology and a Science degree in agricultural engineering. Whoever said there were no smart guys in hockey never met Guy Boucher.

Boucher was born in Notre-Dame-du-Lac, Quebec, a town that, despite joining with nearby Cabano in 2009, has just 5,000 citizens. While it was in rural, Eastern Quebec that Boucher first tied up his skates and hit the frozen pond, the first-year head coach of the Tampa Bay Lightning attributes much of where he is today to his alma mater.

“We’re all the products of what we learn in our lives and the people we meet in our lives. At McGill, there are courses you learn from but I strongly believe that what you learn the most is from people and I’ve been surrounded by amazing people coming out of McGill. I’m still lucky to have [former McGill coach] Marty Raymond around me. He’s Mr. McGill. I’ll be wearing my McGill tie tomorrow.”

Boucher’s connections to McGill are many, and they remain deep. He first came to the school in 1991 and played right wing at McConnell arena for the Redmen until 1995. After a brief, one-year hiatus in France, Boucher returned to Montreal to work as the Redmen’s assistant coach under Martin Raymond, who would eventually become Boucher’s assistant, first with the American Hockey League’s Hamilton Bulldogs and today in Tampa Bay.

Assistant coach Raymond has nothing but praise for the man he helped into the coaching business and who he now works under. The relationship is one of respect and friendship as both men acknowledge that their careers have had very similar trajectories.

“I’m very lucky, I’ve known Guy for a long time. We’ve always kinda followed each others’ footsteps in terms of where are we and what are we doing in terms of systems,” says Raymond. Both men owe much of their success to their work at the CIS level and, like Boucher, Raymond is grateful for his experience at McGill. “I think it’s made great strides since I remember playing in 1987 for McGill in the OUA. The support for athletics has improved tremendously, especially for us at McGill. That’s really helped us get better athletes and give opportunities like the one I’ve had here and last year with Guy, that’s based on the support I had at McGill to showcase my talents.”

In Hamilton, Boucher led his team to an excellent 115 point season, good enough for top spot in the Western Conference. For his efforts, he won the Louis A.R. Pieri Memorial Award as AHL coach of the year. In Hamilton, Boucher was reunited with one of his old McGill players who is now making waves in the NHL, Canadiens left winger Mathieu Darche. On Wednesday, Darche even stopped by the Lightning’s Bell Centre practice to catch up with his old coach. Although they’re now on opposite sides of the rink, Boucher still wishes the best for Darche.

“I’m so busy with the kids and my job that I don’t see the other [McGill] guys a lot. Mathieu, though, obviously I coached him last year and kept a relationship. His wife knows my wife pretty well now. Mathieu’s one of those guys who likes to keep relationships, too. He’s a good guy and I’m so happy he’s still in the NHL. Last year I was telling him at the beginning of the year that I didn’t want him to be an American League leader, I wanted him to be an American League player that wants to go up to the NHL. He’s a great example for kids and guys for tenacity and persistence.”

The tenacity and persistence that Boucher sees in Darche are traits he preaches to all his players. Nate Thompson, another steadfast, hard-working player appreciates the philosophy that Boucher has instilled in his team. “His philosophy is a little bit different with the mental aspect of everything he does. I think with different team-building activities he preaches his enthusiasm and work ethic. We’re having fun but making sure that we’re not getting too complacent or too satisfied. We always want to get better every day and that’s how he’s really helped our team this year.”

Complacency is a killer at this point in the season when most NHL teams have to deal with injuries to top players. The Lightning have had the misfortune to lose both Steve Downie and Ryan Malone, two of the team’s top-six forwards. In a desperate situation such as this, the philosophy of a coach shines through more than the talent of individual players. The coach is honest and realistic about his team. “With two of our top six guys out we’re not the same team. We’re an average team that has to work very hard.”

An “average” team might be a bit of a stretch. As of Sunday, the Lightning sit 5th in the Eastern Conference and are solidly in the playoff picture. Boucher and Raymond came to Tampa Bay at the right time. As a young team loaded up with high draft picks and smart free agent signings by new GM and hall-of-famer Steve Yzerman, the Lightning have gotten their ship in order and are sailing in the right direction. Mainstays from the 2003-2004 Stanley Cup champion team like Captain Vincent Lecavalier and Martin St. Louis have been joined by exciting new players.

Steven Stamkos, who would be just a U2 student at McGill, won last year’s Rocket Richard Trophy with 51 goals to lead the NHL. The budding superstar and former first overall draft pick has experienced three different coaches in his brief NHL career and acknowledges that Boucher has been a key part of the turnaround in Tampa.

“He and the entire coaching staff have been great,” says Stamkos. “We had a lot of changes in this past offseason and a brand new structure, brand new philosophy and atmosphere heading in with a fresh start. Everyone seems to have bought into his different and unique but definitely successful system, and that’s why we’re doing well. We’ve picked up some great players obviously, but everyone’s bought into the system and worked hard. He’s a demanding coach but you do the work and he respects you. That’s how you get results and wins.”

The jovial atmosphere in the dressing room could be felt all around the team on Wednesday as the Lightning practiced for a St. Patrick’s Day tilt with the Canadiens (Montreal would win the game in a shootout). Tampa Bay is on the verge of its first playoff appearance in four years, and are looking for their first series win since hoisting the Cup before the lockout. In a season like this, every game is special, but games at the Bell Centre offer an opportunity for a homecoming for many players and coaches. For Boucher, however, the novelty of coaching against the Canadiens has worn off. It’s now all about business.

“The first game I had 80-some people here, this time I didn’t call anyone. Now I’m trying to keep it real focused. I feel bad about it but with the position we’re in right now with the team, putting in a lot of work with the assistant coaches and with the players, we just need to be focused and get everything out of it.”

In the face of the notorious Quebec sports media, Boucher seemed happy to be spending his first season as an NHL coach in a city where he can walk down the street and not be recognized. “There’s baseball, football, and basketball that are the main sports down there. What’s been a shock is waking up every day with palm trees and nice weather. That kind of shocks you a little bit. When it’s Summer it’s OK but come winter time and you call back here and they say, ‘We just got a metre of snow’ and here you’re by the pool outside, water’s flowing and it’s 25 degrees out, that’s a different reality. But once you get to the rink it’s the same: ice and boards and the guys are focu
sed on hockey.”

Even in the bright sunshine of Florida’s Gulf Coast, Boucher’s heart still clings to the game he’s grown up in. When the weather warms up in his home town and the playoffs get underway, Canadians will flock to their televisions to watch the unfolding drama. At one university in Montreal and in a small town in Eastern Quebec, 35,000 will be cheering for one of their own to achieve the goal that every young Canadian dreams of: hoisting the Stanley Cup.