Patrick Roy meant it. He really did. He was going to be calm, cool, collected, thoughtful, under control, restrained, reasoned ... all of that.
The player who initiated the two famous goalie fights against the Red Wings? The man who lost his cool after Mario Tremblay's "disrespect?" The goalie who didn't hide emotions and, in fact, was fueled by them? Even the fiery junior coach involved in several controversial incidents?
That was another Patrick Roy.
This Patrick Roy was a teacher, a coach, even a father figure who spoke soothingly much of the time.
Oops.
That re-branding was forgotten in the final seconds of the Colorado Avalanche's 6-1 opening-night rout of the Anaheim Ducks in 2013.
Roy got tumultuous cheers from the sold-out house during pregame introductions and at other points when his picture was flashed on the new scoreboard screens. Semyon Varlamov had 35 saves and was tremendous in the net, allowing only Jakob Silfverberg's goal with 6.4 seconds remaining.
That wasn't what the hockey world was talking about the next morning.
It was talking about Roy's actions as the game ended.
The Avalanche coach was irate about what he considered a dangerous knee-on-knee Ben Lovejoy hit on prized rookie Nathan MacKinnon at the Colorado blue line with about 30 seconds left in the game, and there wasn't a stoppage until the lone Anaheim goal ruined Varlamov's shutout.
"I was not happy, first of all, seeing their defenseman kneeing our guy," Roy said later. "That was a knee-to-knee hit, and it should have been a penalty, in my opinion. I certainly didn't like that. When it's 6-0, I don't think this game needs this type of cheap shot."
After Silfverberg's goal, Roy indeed sent out his fourth line for the faceoff, with enforcers Cody McLeod and Patrick Bordeleau flanking center John Mitchell. They weren't out there for a tea party, and McLeod and Bordeleau came off as guys looking to stir up trouble when the puck dropped. Then the clock ran down, with Bordeleau all but ignoring the puck and shoving the Ducks' Matt Beleskey. Forgotten was that Roy had the last change at home and could (and did) claim that he was just continuing to match lines, and Anaheim coach Bruce Boudreau had sent out his fourth line. The puck went over to the bench area, and amid the shoving and maneuvering, the final horn sounded.
But the skaters remained on the ice, compressed in that area; that's when it really got interesting. Several gloves came off and hit the ice in the rugby scrum. The Ducks' Corey Perry, a terrific player but also a noted yapper, was sitting on the dasher near the end of the bench, with his back to the ice and facing Roy. Pretty soon, words went back and forth between Perry and Roy, who came down to get closer, and that incensed Boudreau, who also moved toward the Colorado bench. He was offended by Roy talking to his players, and said so, calling it "bush" . . . and a few other things. Roy pushed the glass between the benches, and the stanchion gave, bending toward the Ducks and toward Boudreau, who reached up to stop it. Roy clearly was surprised that the wall had that much give in it.
Stationed between the benches for the Altitude television broadcast, freelance cameraman John Almering unflinchingly continued his work, filming away as Roy pushed it again, with even more vehemence, and this time he knew it would move as much as it did. It bent even farther into the Ducks' bench as Perry and winger Patrick Maroon shoved it back. By then, more players were on the ice, theoretically for the symbolic skate to the goaltenders; surprisingly, nothing more broke out, especially because McLeod and Bordeleau still looked willing to stir it up. Finally, as things calmed down, the officials signaled that it was OK for the Colorado bench to empty, and the remaining players came out to congratulate Varlamov.
Afterward, Boudreau let Roy have it ... verbally.
"I didn't expect that," he said. "It's not our job to go back and forth with their players. All of a sudden, I told him, 'That's bull, that's bush league,' and he did what he did. He's going to be in for a long year if he's going to yell at every player and yell at the refs at every stoppage of play. It's not the way the game is played."
"At the end, obviously we're frustrated," Boudreau added. "But, I mean, he's got Bordeleau and McLeod on the ice. Even if they start something, a coach has no right to start yapping at players."
Footage from both team broadcasts was up on YouTube, seemingly before the teams left the ice, and was much commented on overnight, and beyond. The consensus: Patrick Roy was being Patrick Roy. It was easy to understand the reaction, but it also was a case of overreaction from those who hadn't been watching or listening to him on a regular basis since he had taken the Colorado job.
Roy was angry, but his outburst was more calculation than explosion. He was standing up for his players.
It was opening night, and he was using the center-stage atmosphere to send a message -- or two. Lovejoy's hit on MacKinnon was shaky and dangerous, and even more so, unnecessary in a 6-0 game. (That works both ways.) Roy would have had Bordeleau and McLeod out there for that faceoff even if Boudreau had sent out his top line (which would have been stupid) or put out the trainer, the bus driver, the massage therapist the video man, and the radio analyst. So there, Roy was probably being a bit disingenuous, but his message was clear and undoubtedly worth what it cost him.
It sure got folks talking.
Officially, Roy drew a game misconduct for the tirade; and the next day, one of the NHL's vice principals checked in. Colin Campbell, for one season a Colorado Rockies defenseman during his journeyman career, announced that Roy was fined $10,000 and called his actions "irresponsible." In the statement issued by the league, Campbell also said, "One of the responsibilities of an NHL coach is to help diffuse volatile situations on the bench."
The next day, some of the media reaction in Denver came from personalities who hadn't been to a practice or an exhibition game and didn't seem to realize that Roy had been restrained until his explosion at the end of the game the night before. But the discerning caught on to the method in Roy's madness and even understood why he said he neither contested the fine nor apologized for his actions.
"This is the role of the coach at some point," he said. "I love my players, and I always will be behind my players.
"A 'D' that skates forward and gets his knee open is dangerous, and it's something that we do not accept," Roy said. "Then, at the end, Perry was talking to me, and I responded, and this is when Boudreau came in. I don't talk to players. I never talk to players. I respect all the players."
And Boudreau's comments?
"What Boudreau said was all lies," Roy said. "I'm certainly not going to get too involved in this one, but when you talk about classless, when you're lying, this is classless. This is the league policy, and I understand it now, but at the same time, I will always defend my players. Things happen. This is the way I dealt with this one. Would I deal with it differently next time? Maybe. Maybe not. I don't know."
The Avalanche -- still struggling to regain their popularity in the market and at the box office -- couldn't have bought that kind of publicity. They had not only won their opener, but had a lot of folks talking -- even in Denver, where many media types thought blanket sports coverage meant discussing how tight Peyton Manning's spiral had been in practice that day, and that Nuggets' exhibition games and preseason coverage were worthy of being played ahead of the Avalanche's real season. The Broncos were 4-0, but for one day, at least, they had to share the spotlight.
Condensed and adapted from "Save By Roy," by Terry Frei and Adrian Dater, copyright 2014. Published by Taylor Trade, an imprint of Rowman & Littlefield. Used by arrangement with the publisher. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or printed without permission in writing from the publisher.