from Cam Cole of the Vancouver Sun,
They got off to a bad start, Ken Hitchcock and Lindy Ruff, opposing coaches in the 1999 Stanley Cup final; two guys left to rationalize the chaotic ending to one of the Cup’s great trench wars.
Ruff, coaching Buffalo, was livid at the way his Sabres lost, at home, in triple overtime, on a goal by Brett Hull that, according to the rules of the day, ought not to have counted.
Hitchcock, proud of an aging Dallas team that, by the end, was running on fumes and grit, sore about being asked, essentially, to apologize for the circumstances of the Stars’ championship, fired back at Ruff’s allegation that Dallas’s win was tainted by league incompetence.
“Tell Lindy to f— off,” Hitchcock spat as he vacated the post-game podium.
Time, though, and a couple of Canadian Olympic team assignments as assistant coaches under Mike Babcock, threw the two of them together and grew a scab over the old cut.
But that deep a wound never entirely heals, and now — Ruff coaching Dallas, Hitchcock with St. Louis, on opposite benches for the West semifinal series that opens Friday night in the Big D...
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