By Matt Vevoda
AnaheimDucks.com

“You have to picture positive things and work through it,” Boudreau said. “You have to believe that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. You have to believe when you do turn it around, then it’s going to be a really good situation. You have to believe there is hope. If you don’t, then what do you play for?”

In the wake of two close home losses over the weekend to begin his tenure as head coach of the Ducks, Bruce Boudreau arrived back at Honda Center for practice on Monday confident that the team will soon start turning things around.

Though the Ducks (7-14-5, 19 points) currently sit in 14th place in the Western Conference, Boudreau has urged the team from the moment he arrived in town last Wednesday to believe in themselves and their ability to climb back up the standings.

“You have to picture positive things and work through it,” Boudreau said. “You have to believe that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. You have to believe when you do turn it around, then it’s going to be a really good situation. You have to believe there is hope. If you don’t, then what do you play for?”

For a group of players who have endured a tough six-week stretch that has included only three wins, the message from Boudreau is starting to sink in. “It’s been missing in this room for a little while,” Bobby Ryan said. “The belief hasn’t been there. We’ve been waiting for something bad to happen game in and game out. You can already see the morale starting to turn. You can see the confidence boost in things we do in practice. Things are starting to catch on.”

“The belief hasn’t been there. We’ve been waiting for something bad to happen game in and game out. You can already see the morale starting to turn. You can see the confidence boost in things we do in practice. Things are starting to catch on.”

Added Cam Fowler, who turned 20 today, “Bruce definitely has a lot of confidence in our group. He wants to come in and be a difference to the team. He has been, as have the assistant coaches. They have brought a new energy into the locker room here and some new systems that we’re still trying to work with. As a whole, the communication between the coaching staff and the players has been really good so far.”

Assistant coach Bob Woods has spent considerable time with the new Anaheim head coach over the years and has seen his strategies work first-hand. Woods was first a player for Boudreau on the 1998-99 Mississippi Sea Wolves, which won the ECHL championship that season.

The duo later came together with the Hershey Bears of the AHL, with Woods serving as an assistant coach to Boudreau. They took home the Calder Cup as league champions in their first season behind the bench there in 2005-06. When Boudreau was promoted to head coach of the Capitals in 2007, Woods served as Hershey’s head coach for two seasons and won another Calder Cup in 2009 (with the help of current Duck Andrew Gordon) before joining Boudreau’s coaching staff in Washington the last two campaigns. They are now in Anaheim together, and Woods sees another bright future ahead.

“Bruce is a great coach,” Woods says. “I have all the confidence in the world in him. We’ve had a lot of success. When you come into a situation like this, you have to almost get back to that teaching part again. Bruce is such a good teacher and motivator. He knows how to make guys believe and be positive.

“He is such a passionate guy. He loves the game and thinks about the game 24/7. A lot of times he doesn’t sleep because of it. He cares about his players and he wants them to have success. He is going to do everything that he can to help them get there. Guys are going to love playing for him. Good things are going to happen sooner than later.”

“He is such a passionate guy. He loves the game and thinks about the game 24/7," Woods (left) says of Boudreau. "A lot of times he doesn’t sleep because of it. He cares about his players and he wants them to have success. He is going to do everything that he can to help them get there. Guys are going to love playing for him. Good things are going to happen sooner than later.”

The Ducks will get another crack at getting Boudreau his first win as head coach tomorrow night against the Kings at Honda Center. It will be the third battle in this season’s Freeway Face-Off, with the Kings earning two wins in a home-and-home set on consecutive nights in mid-November. It’s a rivalry that the Anaheim head coach has quickly embraced.

“There is going to be a lot of hatred on both sides,” said Boudreau, who was a head coach with the Kings’ AHL affiliate in Manchester from 2001-05. “When I was part of the Kings organization, they certainly didn’t like the Ducks. Now that I’m here, I certainly don’t like the Kings. So, let’s get it going.”

A Ducks win over their rivals would not only be sweet, but it would also further develop Boudreau’s message. “I use the saying, ‘It’s the difference between a rut and a groove,’” Boudreau said. “They are both exactly the same things, but with two totally different meanings. Right now, we’re in a rut, but hopefully we can turn it into something else. It usually can happen very quickly.

“In the NHL you play so many games a week, it can turn in a hurry from bad to good. We definitely have to put a little bit of a run together. No better time than starting tomorrow.”