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The new Minnesota Wild head coach is best known for his 409 wins, but there’s a lot more to the new Wild bench boss

 

On May 7, Bruce Boudreau was named the fourth ever head coach of the Minnesota Wild. He comes to St. Paul with a record of 409-192-80 (.659) in nine seasons as an NHL head coach with the Anaheim Ducks and Washington Capitals, leading his team to eight division titles and eight trips to the Stanley Cup Playoffs. But there’s a lot more to Boudreau than just his accomplishments as an NHL head caoch. Following are 10 things you may not know about the Wild’s new bench boss.

 

 

1. Wayne Gretzky grew up idolizing Bourdreau while growing up in Ontario and aimed to break Boudreau’s junior-level scoring records in the Ontario Hockey League.

 

2. During his rookie minor league season with the NAHL’s Johnstown Jets in 1975-76, Boudreau had a minor role in the movie “Slap Shot,” appearing briefly in the No. 7 green jersey of the Hyannisport Presidents against the Hanson brothers and the rest of the Charlestown Chiefs.

 

The Johnstown apartment that Boudreau  shared with teammates Paul Holmgren and Dave Hanson was used in the movie as the residence of Paul Newman’s player-coach character, Reg Dunlop.

 

 

3. That same season, Boudreau made his major league debut, playing 30 games with the Minnesota Fighting Saints. That was the fourth and final season for the team based out of the St. Paul Civic Center, the current site of the Xcel Energy Center, the home of the Wild. The Saints did not finish the 1975-76 season, folding the franchise in late February due to financial struggles.

 

4. Boudreau played 17 seasons in the minor leagues and ranks eighth all-time with 1,368  points, and 13th in both goals and assists with 548 and 820, respectively. He is one of the top 25 all-time scorers in professional hockey.
 

5. Known for being very open and talkative, Boudreau picked up the nickname “Gabby” from a trainer when he was a teenager.

6. In 2009, Boudreau and longtime hockey writer Tim Leone wrote a book of entertaining stories from Boudreau’s years playing and coaching hockey called, “Gabby: Confessions of a Hockey Lifer.” TSN’s Bob McKenzie said of the book, “Gabby’s story is a must-read, because it’s every bit as funny and quirky and nice as the man himself.”
 

 

7. Two weeks before the 1975 NHL Draft, Boudreau and two teammates were arrested for indecent exposure for streaking in a bar in Toronto.

 

“We went into one bathroom, and I stripped naked and put my underwear over my head,” he wrote in his book. “We ran through the bar. Stupid me, I tripped and went headfirst through the band’s bass drum. We ran to the other bathroom.

 

“We were getting dressed, laughing our heads off, when we heard a knock on the door. Two plainclothes cops happened to be in the bar checking for underage drinking and saw us streak.

 

“Great luck, right?”

 

The arrest resulted in Boudreau falling to the third round of the draft with his hometown Maple Leafs selecting the high-scoring center with the 42nd overall pick. A year earlier, the Fighting Saints took Boudreau in the first round of the WHA Amateur Draft with the 14th overall pick.

 

8. According to a tweet from KARE 11’s Dave Schwartz, Boudreau is a comic book buff who owns a copy of “The Amazing Spider-Man #1.”
 

 

9. Boudreau played with 16 professional franchises in seven different leagues during his career:

• Minnesota Fighting Saints (WHA)

• Johnstown Jets (NAHL)

• Toronto Maple Leafs (NHL)

• Dallas Black Hawks (CHL)

• New Brunswick Hawks (AHL)

• Cincinnati Tigers (CHL)

• St. Catharines Saints (AHL)

• ECD Iserlohn (Germany)

• Baltimore Skipjacks (AHL)

• Chicago Black Hawks (NHL)

• Nova Scotia Oilers (AHL)

• Springfield Indians (AHL)

• Newmarket Saints (AHL)

• Phoenix Roadrunners (IHL)

• Fort Wayne Komets (IHL)

• Adirondack Red Wings (AHL)

 

 

He has coached 10 pro teams (as a head, assistant, player-assistant coach) in five different leagues:

• Fort Wayne Komets (IHL)

• Muskegon Fury (CoHL)

• San Francisco Spiders (IHL)

• Mississippi Sea Wolves (ECHL)

• Lowell Lock Monsters (AHL)

• Manchester Monarchs (AHL)

• Hershey Bears (AHL)

• Washington Capitals (NHL)

• Anaheim Ducks (NHL)

• Minnesota Wild (NHL)

10. While he was coaching the Monarchs, Boudreau was scheduled to fly on United Airlines Flight 175 out of Boston on Sept. 11, 2001, but changed his flight to a day earlier to attend Los Angeles Kings organizational meetings. Flight 175 was one of the two planes that terrorists flew into the World Trade Center in New York City. On that flight were Kings scouts Ace Bailey and Mark Bavis.