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friendship goes: Ask either of them the best part of this playoffrun, and he will tell you it's seeing the smile on the other guy'sface. "We're just a couple of blue-collar guys," Sutter said. "We've hada real impact on one another's lives." Owen Nolan, who captained the Sharks under the Dean-Darryl regime,isn't surprised to find them on the cusp of history. "Both of them have the same mindset," Nolan said. "They look for ahardworking team. That's what they base everything on. Skill willonly take you so far. You need a work ethic. And come playoff time,those teams are perfect." On the surface, Lombardi and Sutter ought to have little in common. Sutter, 53, one of six brothers to play in the NHL, grew up on a3,000-acre farm outside Viking, Alberta, a small prairie town. Heturned down offers from Harvard, Princeton and Yale for a prohockey career in which he played 406 NHL games. He is a man of fewwords and so soft-spoken that what he does say often can barely beheard. Lombardi, 54, is a self-described "factory-town rat" fromMassachusetts who earned a law degree at Tulane before climbing theNHL front-office ladder. A history buff who loves to talk aboutanything except himself, Lombardi is intense and tends to broodmore about his perceived failures than his successes. But they became so close in San Jose that Lombardi calls Sutter"the finest man I've ever known." With the Sharks from their inception, Lombardi took over as generalmanager in 1996 and his hiring of Sutter the following year put theteam on an upward trajectory. The Sharks improved in each ofSutter's five full seasons, culminating with the team's firstPacific Division title in 2002. "We weren't the best team, but that was our year," Lombardi said."We were hard to play against. That team just took on the image ofDarryl and epitomized everything he's about." Lombardi has little interest in rehashing how things went south thenext season amid cost-cutting by new ownership, holdouts andinjuries. He focuses on the good times. "If I didn't get my chance up there, I don't think I'm sitting heretoday," Lombardi said. "It was very difficult at the end, no doubtabout it. But what I remember is how when I was fired, 12 playerscame to my house until 4 in the morning. I wouldn't trade thatexperience for anything." It's also worth noting that the first person Lombardi called afterbeing fired, not counting his wife, was the coach he had justcashiered. Sutter never held a grudge. "Hey, you don't shoot the messenger,"he said. On being fired, Sutter said: "That kind of thing hurts, and youwant to talk to someone who's been there. I understood, because weboth had wanted the team to do so well." Sutter landed on his feet quickly, hired to coach Calgary andtaking the Flames to the Stanley Cup finals in 2004. It took longer for Lombardi. Deeply hurt, he retreated to hissummer home in Sonoma and once said he spent four months "in acoma." He re-emerged as a scout for Philadelphia and was named theKings' G.M. in 2006. In Los Angeles, he again set about building a team through thedraft. Expectations were high this season, especially after theacquisition of former Philadelphia Flyers captain Mike Richards.But the team struggled early under coach Terry Murray, and Lombardidecided to make a change. He wanted his old coach. But Sutter was happy at home -- havingresigned as the Flames' G.M. in 2010 -- farming and being a fatherto youngest child Christopher, a 19-year-old with Down syndrome whojust this month graduated from high school. "Hockey might be what I do, but it's not who I am," Sutter said. "Ilike being with my family. If I was going to take another job, ithad to be the right one with relationships I trusted." That happened when Lombardi said: "Let's have another go at it." The G.M. thought Sutter's no-nonsense approach was exactly what theyoung Kings needed. Their shared past made the transition easier as Lombardi describedthe Kings to Sutter in Sharks terms: Jarret Stoll was San Jose'sMike Ricci. Trading for Richards was like when the Sharks addedVinny Damphousse. "There were so many parallels," Lombardi said. "I could tellDarryl, 'This guy is your (Patrick) Marleau, here's your BradStuart, your (Jonathan) Cheechoo, your Gary Suter.' There were alot of touchstones that we could relate to, and we could talk aboutdoing things better than we did in San Jose." Sutter installed an up-tempo style that included an aggressiveforecheck. He tinkered with the lineup. He called out stars DustinBrown and Anze Kopitar for being "stale." He got through tounderachieving players such as Dustin Penner, who had become aleaguewide joke after somehow hurting his back while eatingpancakes. "You have to give Dean credit, because he clearly brought insomeone who addressed exactly what we needed," defenseman WillieMitchell said. "Our preparation wasn't the best. And you know withDarryl Sutter, you've got preparation." The final piece was Lombardi's risky February trade for Columbusforward Jeff Carter, who provided a scoring boost. The Kings went25-13-11 under Sutter and made the playoffs by the skin of theirteeth. They have been virtually unbeatable since. In Game 5 of the conference finals Tuesday, Justin Williams missedan open net in overtime -- the play that made Sutter and Lombardicringe while thinking of Selanne -- before Penner scored theseries-winner. Afterward, Kings players took note of how deeply thelow-key Lombardi reveled in the moment. "He's always saying that because he doesn't have any children,we're all like his kids," Penner said. "I've never seen a G.M. soexcited and wanting everyone to succeed." Now, the Dean and Darryl Show goes for its first Stanley Cup. And the best part, says the coach whom Lombardi once fired, "is weare doing it together." Contact Mark Emmons at 408-920-5745. We are high quality suppliers, our products such as China Epoxy Glass Sheet , China ABS Plastic Sheets for oversee buyer. To know more, please visits Wave Solder Pallet.
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