Montreal 'always a special place' for Capitals assistant Muller

MONTREAL -- It was well before the Washington Capitals would be headed to Bell Centre to play the Montreal Canadiens during the Stanley Cup Playoffs that Capitals assistant coach Kirk Muller would have a few words of advice for his team.

"I'll definitely warn the guys to be ready for the full Montreal blitz, and not just in the arena. From their hotel room to the rink," Muller said with a laugh.

The Capitals have the Canadiens' backs a bit up against the wall, leading 2-0 in the best-of-7 series heading into Game 3 of the Eastern Conference First Round on Friday (7 p.m., ET, CBC, TVAS, SN, TNT, truTV, MNMT, MAX).

"This is the only time in my 40 years in the NHL that I'll have played or coached against Montreal," Muller said. "It's going to be a little strange for me, going against them head to head for the first time. I enjoyed it with the Canadiens and now I'm on the other side, part of this [Capitals] group, and we have a fun group. I'm excited, and I'm really excited for the people on our team to experience what the energy and the challenge are going to be like."

Canadiens alternate captain Kirk Muller hoists the Stanley Cup overhead in 1993 in the team's Montreal Forum dressing room.

Muller still has many fans in Montreal, no matter that he's now behind the "wrong" bench. He was selected by the New Jersey Devils with the No. 2 pick of the 1984 NHL Draft, which was held at the Montreal Forum. He played seven seasons with the Devils before being traded to the Canadiens on Sept. 20, 1991, along with Roland Melanson for Stephane Richer and Tom Chorske.

With an easy smile, happy manner with fans and a good scoring touch, Muller quickly became a crowd favorite during his four seasons. He would score the Stanley Cup-clinching goal on Forum ice against the Los Angeles Kings on June 9, 1993, the Canadiens' 24th and most recent championship, then served as co-captain with Mike Keane in 1994-95.

Muller was traded to the New York Islanders, along with Mathieu Schneider and Craig Darby, for Pierre Turgeon and Vladimir Malakhov on April 5, 1995.

His 19-season playing career ended with the Dallas Stars in 2002-03 after stops with the Toronto Maple Leafs and Florida Panthers. Muller soon found his way into coaching, first with Queen's University in his hometown of Kingston, Ontario, and a couple of Team Canada tournament squads before he was hired as a Canadiens assistant coach in 2006.

Kirk Muller with a New Jersey Devils jersey at the Montreal Forum during the 1984 NHL Draft.

He would move to the Nashville Predators organization, coaching their American Hockey League affiliate in Milwaukee, then took the head coaching job with the Carolina Hurricanes in November 2011. More work would follow in St. Louis as an assistant, then Montreal again and Calgary as an associate before he joined the Capitals on July 20, 2023, as an assistant on coach Spencer Carbery's staff.

For five of the six games against Philadelphia in the second round of the 2020 Stanley Cup Playoffs, Muller served as Canadiens interim coach when chest pains sent Claude Julien to a Toronto hospital for emergency treatment.

Montreal has for decades been a precious part of Muller's life, from the day he was drafted by the Devils at the Forum.

"I just have good memories of the city," he said. "I spent more time in my career in Montreal than anywhere, as a player or coach. My kids went to school there and spent important years of their lives there. I still have many friends there.

"Win a Stanley Cup anywhere, with such a good group, and you'll cherish that always. I was drafted in Montreal, played there, was traded to Montreal, won a Cup and was co-captain there, traded from there, hired and fired from there," he added with a laugh. "At the end of the day the people have always treated me great. It's always a special place for me."

Canadiens coach Jacques Demers (l.) and GM Serge Savard with Kirk Muller before the start of the 1994-95 season, Muller a co-captain with Mike Keane.

Muller said he'd consider walking from the Capitals hotel to Bell Centre, "Part of the culture, the excitement of it all. That's always been a great thing about the people in Montreal, they want to say hi, they're big fans, but they respect your privacy too."

He expected to have a large group of family and friends, from Montreal and Kingston, in a Bell Centre suite during Game 3 and Game 4 on Sunday.

A shuffle across the rink from the visitors dressing room to the team bench is always an experience, Muller said, joking, "I'll hold my breath this time, and maybe wear my helmet."

He might glance up to the arena rafters and see the 1993 Stanley Cup banner hanging over the ice, remembering if even for a heartbeat the memories of that championship. It was a wild night in Montreal 32 years ago, a riot of fans in the streets keeping the triumphant Canadiens in their Forum dressing room until the smoke had cleared.

"Beating [Wayne] Gretzky in the Final, how nervous we were," Muller said. "The whole experience that year, winning 10 overtime games in a row. Sitting there that night, it was a lifetime's dream, not just one year.

"The riot was unfortunate, of course, but what it did was keep us all there with [Canadiens legends] Rocket Richard, Yvan Cournoyer, Guy Lafleur, Jean Beliveau … to sit with those alumni, and others, I just thought, 'This is the greatest time of my life in hockey.' You don't plan that if you win the Cup you'll do this or that. Sitting with those people, then celebrating the next few days with the people of Montreal, was so special.

Canadiens associate coach Kirk Muller speaks to Max Pacioretty (l.), Andrei Markov (c.) and Shea Weber during a 2017 Bell Centre game.

"I was so impressed with the Canadiens alumni, who had done so much more than we had. How much they respected the active players when we were there, the way they conducted themselves and the respect they gave us, the whole thing was such a cool experience."

Fast forward three-plus decades to this season and Muller's front-row spot to watch Capitals captain Alex Ovechkin pass Gretzky to become the NHL all-time leading goal-scorer.

"Watching 'O' the last two years, all the media attention on the chase … even Wayne said he didn't have that until he was five or seven goals away," Muller said. "'O' lived with it for a couple of years.

"Our players deserve a lot of credit. A lot of things they did in their game was to try to help him get that milestone. Everyone was so respectful of 'O' for what he did. That's a lot to be said about him as a character, how much the guys rallied to want to see him do it, the joy of him scoring. Our coaches were collectively happy, very involved to be a part of it."

Washington Capitals coach Spencer Carbery (l.) and assistant Kirk Muller behind their team's Bell Centre bench on Feb. 17, 2024.

Muller said that Ovechkin's passion for the game is one of his greatest assets, an energy that has rubbed off on his teammates this season.

"He's a big personality and it rubs off," he said. "We weren't a team that was supposed to be making the playoffs, and we wind up winning the [Metropolitan] division. The hype this year brought out the best of our guys."

Muller took no souvenir from the game against the New York Islanders on April 6, when Ovechkin scored his 895th goal to pass Gretzky, saying the coaches had bagged autographed Ovechkin jerseys before the record was set.

"In the closet, a great one for the grandkids," he said.

Muller was reminded of another souvenir hunter, from 1993, Canadiens coach Jacques Demers getting a stick from Gretzky after the final siren at the Forum.

"Jacques was a cagey veteran," Muller said, laughing again. "He snagged it even before the handshakes. He was thinking ahead."

Top photo: Washington Capitals assistant coach Kirk Muller speaks to the team, captain Alex Ovechkin perched on the boards, at Capital One Arena in January 2025.