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Dan Bylsma, the Penguins' interim head coach, has been behind the bench for just one game.
That means he is pretty much a blank sheet for most players, who know him only from practices he has run during training camp.
Not Chris Minard, though.
He played 34 games under Bylsma for the Penguins' minor league team in Wilkes-Barre this season and 56 in 2007-08, when Bylsma was an assistant to Todd Richards, and professes to be impressed by what he has seen.
"He's very smart," Minard said. "Very energetic. He wants to win, wants to be the best. He wants to be in the NHL, and is very confident in the way he does things and looks at the game."
Making the transition from the American Hockey League to the NHL can be a challenge, especially for a guy with just a half-season of head-coaching experience in the minors, but Minard said he does not expect it to cause any major problems for Bylsma.
• Age: 38.
• Hometown: Grand Haven, Mich.
• College: Played at Bowling Green, 1988-92.
• NHL draft: Selected in the sixth round in 1989 by Winnipeg, but never played for the Jets.
• NHL career: Played 429 games for the Los Angeles Kings and Anaheim Ducks over nine seasons. Finished career with 19 goals and 43 assists.
• Coaching: Began coaching career in 2003 as an assistant with the Cincinnati Mighty Ducks of the AHL.
"He has enough confidence in the way he does things and the way he carries himself that he's just going to jump in and do what he does," he said. "He has confidence in the ability that got him here, so why change anything?"
Whether the Penguins will be able to get their season back on track in the remaining 24 games remains to be seen.
They definitely will get on a track, though, before the week is over.
The Penguins, who generally fly to road games, will ride a train Saturday from Philadelphia to Washington, after facing the Flyers.
Although the team will depart from and arrive at stations that serve the general public, it will not be taking a regularly scheduled Amtrak train, but a three-car charter.
The trip is expected to take about 75 minutes, and the Penguins likely will get to their hotel in Washington faster than they would if they flew because the train station is relatively close to the hotel.
When they fly into Washington, they usually land at Baltimore-Washington International Airport, which actually is just south of Baltimore, and take a lengthy bus ride into the nation's capital.
Bylsma has made it clear that he wants to coach an aggressive, attacking game designed to take maximum advantage of the Penguins' speed and skill, which isn't necessarily the style his game was tailored to during his playing days.
Bylsma was a blue-collar winger who played 429 games with Los Angeles and Anaheim, accumulating 19 goals, 43 assists and 183 penalty minutes before retiring after the 2003-04 season.
His most productive offensive season was 2001-02, when he put up eight goals and nine assists in 77 games with the then-Mighty Ducks.
"He was a hard-nosed, shot-blocking kind of player," said Penguins defenseman Hal Gill, who recalled playing against Bylsma at least once.
Right winger Petr Sykora actually saw quite a bit more of him. He and Bylsma were teammates when Anaheim lost to New Jersey in the 2003 Stanley Cup final.
"He was a role player," Sykora said. "He was good on penalty-killing, would always chip in with a big goal. He was great at blocking shots.
"You know, that dirty work that needs to be done. He was one of the hardest-working guys I've met in hockey."
Bylsma gave the Penguins yesterday off. ... Bylsma, who made his NHL coaching debut in the Penguins' 3-2 shootout loss Monday to the New York Islanders on Long Island, said he did not experience any major nervousness and that he was "surprisingly comfortable" when conducting his pregame meeting with the players.
