QUEBEC CITY — As the highlights of Patrick Roy’s first morning skate with the Islanders made their way around Canada — Roy correcting, demanding, whistling and forcing the Isles to run line rushes again and again until they got it right — the Gatineau Olympiques watched on with interest.
This, they noticed, looked a whole lot like what their coach, Benoit Desrosiers, had them doing every day in the Quebec Maritimes Junior Hockey League.
“It was the same drills. They said the same words. They were just yelling the same stuff,” Olympiques left wing Justin Dumais told The Post. “They definitely have a resemblance.”
By then, rumors already were flying about Desrosiers coming to join Roy on Long Island. The Islanders put out a statement the Monday after Roy was hired shooting down a report that Desrosiers had been hired, but allowed that he would meet with Lou Lamoriello in the future.