To shave or not to shave? For the Canes, another playoff question
Rod Brind’Amour never grew a playoff beard as a player, never saw the need.
Two reasons, the Carolina Hurricanes coach said. One, he’s not that superstitious. And two, can you imagine Rod Brind’Amour with a beard?
A photo of the Canes’ 2006 Stanley Cup celebration on the ice shows fully-bearded players everywhere. Ray Whitney, Erik Cole, Bret Hedican, Aaron Ward, Matt Cullen. But not Brind’Amour, the captain of the champions, the first one to raise the Cup. Sitting behind Williams in the group shot, he looks like he just shaved.
“I always thought everybody grows playoff beards but their record isn’t very good,” Brind’Amour said. “Only one team wins. Something’s not right with that. Something’s not adding up. There are 15 teams it’s not working for.
“And I don’t have a very good beard, so ...”
For some of the Canes, it could be a futile pursuit. Sebastian Aho and Teuvo Teravainen, both fresh-faced Finns, quickly come to mind although Teravainen does have a few whiskers (look closely, they’re there.) And captain Justin Williams already had someone to nominate for “worst beard” -- winger Brock McGinn.
“It’s a terrible beard, it’s not good,” Williams deadpanned.
McGinn begs to differ, to a point.
“We’ll see how it goes along the way but there’s a couple of guys in here that I don’t know if they can grow a hair on their face,” McGinn said, smiling and looking in Aho’s direction.
There were so many beards among the Canes defenseman this season that it seemed like something necessary to be in their D-man fraternity. Jaccob Slavin has long had a full beard, neatly groomed, and Justin Faulk needs little time to let one grow out.
Defenseman Brett Pesce shaved Monday and had the stubble thing going Tuesday, saying, “This is it. Now it begins.”
Many believe the tradition of the playoff beard began with the New York Islanders in the 1980s. Win the Stanley Cup and there can be some bushy, smiling faces next to the Cup.
“We don’t have a lot of great beards,” Williams said. “Actually we have great beards but we don’t have a lot of them.”
What about gray beards?
“We have one gray beard,” Williams said.
This story was originally published April 9, 2019 at 3:19 PM.
