Maybe when coach Darryl Sutter got home Thursday night after guiding the Calgary Flames to a Stanley Cup finals appearance earlier in the evening, the first thing he did was let out a primal scream of joy.

Perhaps once he was behind the privacy of his own front door, hockey’s stoic man let down his guard, possibly even exchanged a few high fives with family members.

Anyone who knows Sutter knows that wasn’t the case, because let’s face it, teams don’t pay coaches to get to the Stanley Cup finals.

They get paid to win it. And Sutter comes from a long line of proud people, folks who take getting the job done very seriously. Second-best isn’t going to be good enough for him.

"If you want to get excited about it, get excited about it," Sutter explained. "Here’s the mindset. You have to really compete like heck to be a playoff team. And if you are, then you have a chance, then you are one of 16.

"That’s how we have looked at it. We just try to stay kind of even with it."

If the Patricks, whose bloodlines in the game run back to before the birth of the National Hockey League, are hockey’s royal family, then the Sutters are hockey’s blue collar family.

Their solution to any problem is as simple as it is straightforward.

You’ve just got to work harder. But scratch below the surface and there’s much more to the Sutters than that.

Six of Grace and Louis Sutter’s sons — all from the farming town of Viking, Alberta, population 1,200 — earned their way to the NHL as players.

None of them ever won any of the major hardware that the league hands out at its awards banquet every spring, but to suggest their impact on the game has not been immense is to not know what you are talking about.

From 1976 through 2001, there was at least one Sutter brother performing in NHL rinks. Together, they played nearly 5,000 games and scored 1,300 goals.

Two of them are current NHL coaches, Darryl and Brian, with the Chicago Blackhawks. Duane Sutter briefly coached the Florida Panthers and Brent coached the Western Hockey League’s Red Deer Rebels to the 2001 Memorial Cup championship. Twins Rich and Ron, the youngest members of the family, work as NHL scouts.

Words that a Sutter lives by — work ethic, loyalty, determination, desire, heart, passion, character and discipline. One word that no Sutter will ever tolerate — compromise.

A Sutter plays hard. A Sutter plays hurt. A Sutter plays the cards dealt to them without complaint. As coaches, it’s all they ask of their players.

When Darryl was coaching in Chicago, he shrugged in disbelief after a game while trying to explain Blackhawks winger Joe Murphy’s dispassionate effort playing on the top line with future Hall of Fame center Denis Savard.

"If I knew I was going to get to play on Denis Savard’s line, I’d run all the way to the rink," Sutter said.

The Sutters are loathe to talk about any individual honors they’ve accrued and you won’t find any baubles from previous championships cluttering up their fingers. They thrive on a challenge and believe that what’s in front of you, what’s yet to be done, is far more important than what you’ve already accomplished.

It’s always been that way with them.

"He was a very hard-working, honest, team-oriented player," San Jose coach Ron Wilson remembered of Darryl, his minor-league teammate with Moncton of the AHL in the late 1970s.

Brian was the first to make the NHL, with St. Louis in 1976. Darryl followed three years later, but not before finding a unique method of letting Chicago know that its contract offer wasn’t up to snuff.

Selected 179th by the Blackhawks in the 1978 NHL draft, Sutter instead signed with the Iwakura Tomakomai of the Japanese League, where he led the league in scoring and was named rookie of the year.

Another Sutter trait. They get their point across. Even to family members. They’ve never known any tougher competition than the torrid ball hockey battles held between the six brothers as youngsters in the loft of the barn on the family farm. Sutters have battled each other on the ice and coached each other in the NHL, but insist it’s not difficult to put aside their love for each other.

"That’s easy," Darryl said. "During hockey season, we’re not brothers. Family is for the offseason."

No wonder, that in an era where top players are often coddled, Sutter isn’t afraid to publicly call out his stars and let them know if their effort wasn’t good enough. After Calgary lost its playoff opener to Vancouver, Sutter was harsh in his criticism of Hart Trophy finalist Jarome Iginla and Vezina Trophy finalist Miikka Kiprusoff, clearly Calgary’s most valuable players.

"They had to play better for us," Sutter said frankly. "Jarome was one of them. I mean, he’s our best player and our captain and we couldn’t go very far without him at the top of his game."

Sometimes, Sutter finds more subtle ways to deliver the message.

Colorado Avalanche coach Tony Granato played for Sutter in San Jose and recalled being on the end of a cold stare after returning to the bench following a particularly uneventful turn on the ice.

"Nice shift, Cammi," Sutter said.

Cammi Granato, Tony’s sister, plays for the U.S. women’s Olympic team.

The players generally understand that it’s nothing personal, simply the Sutter way of letting everyone know that no one is above the team. That comes through in his coaching strategy. He’ll put fourth-line players out for power-play shifts, a way of informing them they are also significant in the grand scheme of things.

"I don’t know if it’s one of my strengths, but it’s a strength of every good coach," Sutter said.

His players certainly view it as a Sutter strength, but feel it’s a trait that often overshadows his other qualities.

"As far as his coaching style, people know he’s very fired up, but he also really studies the game," Iginla said. "He really knows his stuff and he’s had a big impact on our club."

The Flames hired Sutter as coach midway through last season and named him general manager in the summer. People scoffed at the choice, but look at Sutter’s additions since then — goalie Kiprusoff, defenseman Rhett Warrener and forwards Ville Nieminen, Marcus Nilson, Krzysztof Oliwa and Chris Simon — are all significant pieces to Calgary’s puzzle and evidence that Sutter knows much about team building and the players who perform in the NHL.

"It’s not about one guy or one player," Sutter said. "It’s about drafting and developing and making the right moves along the way."

Get to know Sutter and you’ll discover that he’s a stand-up guy who exudes class and is all about dignity. After eliminating San Jose in the Western Conference finals, he stood by the exit from the ice for the Sharks dressing room and spoke with every one of his former players.

"I felt bad for them, they’re special guys," Sutter said. "Those guys are winners, too."

He tells a pretty fair tale, enjoys a good laugh and cares deeply about the game and the people who play for him. It’s that same character that told him to step down as Chicago Blackhawks coach in 1995 because his son Christopher, who has Down’s Syndrome, needed him more at the time than he needed hockey.

Another Sutter quality. They know what matters most and display a knack for keeping things in perspective.

"This is the most mentally tough group that I’ve ever been associated with," Sutter said of the Flames. "We made a deal with everybody last July 1 that we are not going to let anything distract us."

It’s all about sticking together working towards a common goal. Among all the Sutter traits, the most important is to never put yourself ahead of the team. While Tampa Bay’s John Tortorella and Philadelphia’s Ken Hitchcock entertained everyone with their war of words during the Eastern Conference finals, Sutter does his best to deflect attention away from him towards his team.

"It’s not about the coaches, it’s about the players," he insists.

Regardless of what Sutter believes, his Flames are on the brink of doing something remarkable and no matter how much the man behind the bench tries to downplay his role, it’s the passion that burns within his heart that has sparked this team’s bid for greatness.

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