Welter: Rod Brind'Amour breathes a breath of peppermint fresh air into Hurricanes

By Pat Welter, WRAL Sports reporter

Coaching is stressful. You don't need a scientific study to tell you that. Hurricanes head coach Rod Brind'Amour feels it just like you'd expect.

"It's not like coaching your little kids, that's for sure," Brind'Amour said. "Obviously it's a lot of fun or I wouldn't be doing it."

As a player Brind'Amour forever holds a place in Canes history. He was the team captain for the 2006 Stanley Cup Champion team, his number 17 jersey has been retired and hangs in the PNC Arena rafters.

His resume as a coach has grown quick.

"I know it's a huge opportunity, a huge challenge, but one that I feel real confident that I can do," Brind'Amour said at his introductory press conference after getting named head coach in May of 2018.

Prior to Brind'Amour, the Canes had missed the playoffs nine straight years. With Brind'Amour behind the bench the Canes are beginning their fifth straight playoff campaign.

You could say he's breathed new life into the franchise. Turns out that breath happens to be minty fresh.

"I guess on the bench and stuff he's always chewing gum," Hurricanes defenseman Brady Skjei laughed.

Skjei hadn't really thought of it until I asked him, but if you watch the games on TV you probably have or you will now. Every Canes period, every game, begins with a piece of gum.

"Regular peppermint, all he chews," Hurricanes assistant equipment manager Patrick Budds said as he took a box of Extra Peppermint gum down from a shelf in an equipment room. "Just got to make sure it's always out there. I think one time in preseason we forgot. He was running around with his head cut off a little bit."

"Absolutely not at all," Brind'Amour laughed as I asked him how much gum factors into his coaching. "I don't even think about it. There's no magic in that."

There might be no magic, but there's definitely a method. Every period before taking the bench Brind'Amour and several of his assistants will grab a piece of gum from a station conveniently located on the Canes bench right next to a jar of smelling salts.

"I don't do smelling salts," Brind'Amour said of his time as a player. "I've got a pretty big nose. It'd get it all up there so I stay out of that."

When asked if he can remember the last time he went a period without a piece of gum, he had to stop and chew on it.

"There was a game somewhere – and it's been years – where I walked out and there was nothing," Brind'Amour recalled his side of Budds' story. "I passed the gum and then went out and didn't chew it. I don't remember what happened. I'm a superstitious guy, but I try not to add to it."

I told him how Budds remembered the series of events, and Brind'Amour admitted he really can't go without his piece of peppermint.

"I gotta have it, and they are real good about it," Brind'Amour laughed. "I give them credit, these little things the trainers do there's so much stuff going on that matters, but these little things they are on it too. Details are important."

It's safe to say that as long as Brind'Amour is head coach the Canes won't ever lose their flavor.