\u201cShe\u2019s smiling now, I\u2019ll tell you that,\u201d St. Louis said about his mother during his first news conference after being hired by the Canadien<\/a>s. \u201cShe always told me, \u2018Show them, Marty,\u2019 and I know she\u2019s saying that: \u2018Yeah, you\u2019re showing them again.\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n \u201cShow them\u201d is something St. Louis\u2019s mother, France, told her son when he came home crying after being cut from the Laval Double-A team in his first year of peewee hockey. She told him that again after he wasn\u2019t selected at the NHL Draft because he was only 5-foot-8. She would have told him that if she was alive when he was named head coach of the Canadiens.<\/p>\n Sadly, on May 8, 2014, St. Louis\u2019s mother died suddenly at age 63 from a heart attack. Three days later \u2014 on Mother\u2019s Day \u2014 St. Louis scored a goal at Madison Square Garden to help his New York Rangers avoid elimination with a 3-1 win over the Pittsburgh Penguins in Game 6 of their second-round playoff series with his father, sister and wife in the stands.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n \u201cShe built my confidence,\u201d St. Louis said about his mother when I had a one-on-one interview with him shortly after he had been named head coach of the Canadiens. \u201cMy mom believed in me so much she made me believe in myself so much.\u201d<\/p>\n St. Louis still leans on his mother.<\/p>\n \u201cI spoke to my mother a lot during the overtime,\u201d St. Louis told reporters in Buffalo after the Canadiens beat the Sabres 3-2 in Game 7 of their second-round playoff series Monday night on a goal by Alex Newhook. \u201cI thanked her.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n St. Louis has done an outstanding job since taking over as head coach, being a teacher and a father figure for his young players. Four years into a rebuild, the Canadiens are the youngest team in the playoffs for the second straight season and beat the Hurricanes 6-2 in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference final Thursday night in Carolina. The Canadiens are now seven wins away from the Stanley Cup.<\/p>\n While St. Louis\u2019s mother isn\u2019t around to watch her son coach the Canadiens, his father is enjoying every second of it. Normand St. Louis always seems to have a smile on his face when he\u2019s at the Bell Centre wearing a Canadiens ball cap to games. A lifelong Canadiens fan, Normand grew up on a family lumber mill in Mont-Laurier, the 10th of 14 children. The family would listen to Canadiens games on the radio because they didn\u2019t have a TV.<\/p>\n \u201cMy dad didn\u2019t have time to be an athlete,\u201d St. Louis told me in that one-on-one interview shortly after the Canadiens hired him. \u201cMy dad started working at 8 years old on the wood mill. He played hockey, but it was outdoors Sunday with his brothers and other families. But they worked. So if anything that my dad passed down to me is the work ethic. But, more importantly, is how you treat people with respect no matter who you are, what you are. My dad really helped me to be a good human, not a good hockey player. And I think that\u2019s more important in anything to have success.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The Canadiens have put a lot of focus on building a solid team culture during this rebuild and that is showing on the ice. The players really care about each other and have become a band of brothers with St. Louis as their leader. They never give up on themselves or each other as was shown in Game 7 wins over the Tampa Bay Lightning in the first round and the Sabres in the second round \u2014 both on the road.<\/p>\n \u201cI feel what stands out to me is they celebrate everyone,\u201d St. Louis told reporters in Carolina ahead of Game 1. \u201cThey\u2019re happy for the group. Obviously, it\u2019s different guys at different times, but they\u2019re happy for everyone and I feel that\u2019s not the norm.\u201d<\/p>\n After he was hired, St. Louis said \u201caccountability\u201d would be the key to the team culture he wanted to build.<\/p>\n \u201cAccountability, not just on the ice,\u201d he said. \u201cAccountability off the ice. How you treat people around here, how you treat your teammates. You don\u2019t build culture on the ice. The culture is built so far off the ice.\u201d<\/p>\n St. Louis understood why some people were skeptical after the Canadiens hired him \u2014 but he didn\u2019t care.<\/p>\n \u201cPeople are entitled to their opinion,\u201d he said during his first news conference. \u201cAll that stuff as an athlete, as a human, all that stuff that people want to doubt or talk and say and comment, to me it\u2019s all noise. It\u2019s always been noise. I\u2019ve always been a guy that blocked the noise and gets after it, and that\u2019s what I intend to do. It doesn\u2019t matter what I say, what experience I have, I\u2019m still going to get judged on how I perform and how I can help this team.<\/p>\n \u201cGive me a chance and I\u2019ll show you what I can do.\u201d<\/p>\n His mother would be so proud.<\/p>\n![\"Canadiens](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/0522-spt-col-cowan-2026.jpg\")
Canadiens head coach Martin St. Louis watches overtime of Game 6 of against the Tampa Bay Lightning in Montreal on May 1. John Mahoney \/ Montreal Gazette<\/p>\n