Three former Flyers have coached teams into 2019 Stanley Cup playoffs

Three NHL head coaches who have led their teams into the Stanley Cup playoffs — St. Louis’ Craig Berube, Dallas’ Jim Montgomery, and Carolina’s Rod Brind’Amour — have a common bond.

All played for the Flyers.

Berube also coached the Flyers. All are in their first seasons leading their respective teams, and all say that, in different ways, their time with the Flyers helped their coaching careers.

In the opening round of the playoffs, all three of the former Flyers’ teams will be underdogs: Berube’s Blues will face Winnipeg, Montgomery’s Stars will meet Nashville, and Brind’Amour’s Hurricanes will try to dethrone Stanley Cup-champion Washington.

Montgomery, who coached for five seasons at the University of Denver before getting the Stars job, played briefly with the Flyers in the 1994-95 and 1995-96 seasons. He also spent three seasons with the AHL’s Philadelphia Phantoms, coached by Bill Barber. He had 19 goals and 62 points on the 1997-98 Phantoms, helping them win the Calder Cup.

He credits Barber with instilling traits he carried into coaching.

“I was around the old-school, Broad Street Bully Flyers,” Montgomery said the other day. “I was very fortunate to have Billy as my coach for three years. And being around Clarkie [Bob Clarke] as a GM and Homer [Paul Holmgren] was great. The one thing I [learned] is the importance of being hard to play against and showing up every day, and being a really good teammate.

“When we were winning, it was a great feeling, and when we were losing, Billy made life miserable for us,” Montgomery added. “So we didn’t want to be losing long, and that’s something I took with me into my coaching.”

Montgomery made life miserable for the Stars in January, calling out his players shortly after consecutive losses to the then-worst-in-the-NHL Flyers and then-struggling St. Louis.

“I’m frustrated that I have not been able to gain consistency in our performance,” he said at the time, “and I haven’t been able to change the culture of mediocrity.”

Eventually, he did. The Stars went 20-11-3 in their final 34 games, and they clinched a playoff spot with a 6-2 rout of the Flyers last week.

Berube’s Blues had even a better run. St. Louis was 7-9-3 when he replaced the fired Mike Yeo on Nov. 19, and it fell into last in the 31-team league before winning 11 straight from Jan. 23 to Feb. 19. The Blues went 38-19-6 under Berube.

As the numerous players acquired or signed in the offseason became more familiar with one another and developed some chemistry, St. Louis took off.

“Early on, I think that was a big thing,” Berube, who is expected be made the Blues’ permanent coach, said of the players’ unfamiliarity with one another. “When you bring in new guys, when you bring in good players – and you already have good players – everybody’s trying to find what their role is and trying to fit in. I thought it was an issue, but that’s changed and we kind of have everybody on the same page and where they fit in.

"Everybody’s putting the team first, and that’s the biggest thing. Guys are playing for each other and working for each other. When we got that going, everything started to turn around.”

Berube said he became a better coach because of his time with the Flyers.

“I was surrounded by good coaches, for sure. John Stevens, Ken Hitchcock. And being around [executives] Bob Clarke and Paul Holmgren, there’s a lot you can learn from those guys,” he said, adding his coaching “mindset” was developed in Philadelphia. “I was there for a number of years and was put in a good situation.”

Carolina, like St. Louis and Dallas, finished strong as it earned its first playoff berth since 2009. The Hurricanes had a 15-17-5 record and were 10 points out of a playoff spot Dec. 29 before, stunningly, going 31-12-2 the rest of the way and surging into the postseason.

With relentless work ethic, the Hurricanes mirrored the way their coach, Brind’Amour, played during his superb 20-year career, including nine seasons with the Flyers.

Carolina went 0-3-1 against the Caps this season.

“You’ve got to be able to grind,” Brind’Amour said of the grueling playoffs, “and we’ve done that all season.”

Just as their coach did in his playing days.