I also remember Montreal Canadiens center Guy Carbonneau pointing to goalie Patrick Roy standing up in front of his teammates before the third period with the Los Angeles Kings ahead and in danger of taking a 2-0 lead in the 1993 Stanley Cup Finals.

''This wasn't a Knute Rockne win-one-for-the-Gipper thing, it was Patrick confidently telling us that he wasn't going to let in any more goals and he was counting on us to rally,'' Carbonneau remembered of Montreal's 3-2 overtime victory. ''With each save he made, you could feel the confidence of the rest of the guys on the ice and the bench grow.''

One year later, it was Messier's "Guaranteed Win" speech splashed all over the New York newspapers with the New York Rangers trailing the Devils in the Eastern Conference Finals -- only to see the Rangers rally to win that series and beat Vancouver in a seven-game series for its first Stanley Cup since 1940.

We've basically touched on the importance of captains and leaders in the playoffs, but the real, passionate leader leads at just the right time, whether that be the first game of training camp, a Christmas thriller, or an even more important game down the stretch.

Here's one of my favorites -- and it came from a player on the other team, which underscores the admiration for a player in my mind.

''I'm standing there looking at Scott Stevens screaming at his teammates, pleading with them, imploring them to be better,'' recalled a stunned Darius Kasparaitis, a defenseman with the Penguins early in the 2001 season. ''I couldn't believe it. We're being embarrassed 9-0 -- 9-0 -- in a late-October game, with less then two minutes left, and he's all over his teammates about giving up one scoring chance.''

According to Kasparaitis, this is what Stevens said: ''If you can't finish off this game, what makes you think we'll be able to do it the next time, or the time after that? You don't remain champions by letting anyone off the hook, in any situation. Let's shut these guys down and show why we're the defending Stanley Cup champions.''

In the playoffs, one-on-one battles make or break a series. Neutralizing your opponent's best players becomes an interesting subplot every time the puck is dropped. You can expect to see that kind of game-within-a-game drama continue as the playoffs progress -- and you can clearly see why the captains earned the "C."

The philosophy is simple: Forget the individual goals. There's no room for looking at personal newspaper clippings.

''You may need a Kevin Costner or Tom Hanks or Jack Nicholson to make a great movie, but in hockey you need the glamour boys to get down and dirty,'' says Flyers coach Ken Hitchcock, referring to how much he learned about his players in Dallas when the Stars won the 1999 Stanley Cup. ''People looked at Mike Modano, for the great play, and Brett Hull, for the goals. Both had to change, become team players to win their Academy Award in the NHL.

''Best actor? That doesn't count. Best picture? That's the whole ballgame here. And to win that, you have to show more passion, more sacrifice than you ever thought possible.''

Yzerman sacrificing his scoring, the same with Modano and Hull (who now has won in both Dallas and Detroit), shows that even players without the "C" hold themselves accountable as leaders. They also show that advanced speechmaking isn't the only sign of a great captain -- or leader.

''You want your captain to embody all the great parts of an athlete,'' says Florida Panthers coach Mike Keenan, who won a Stanley Cup with the Rangers and took two Flyers teams and one Chicago Blackhawks team to the Finals. ''They're supposed to be fearless. They're supposed to rise to the challenge and not bend. They're supposed to be tough mentally, a great example for their teammates to follow during the grind they face in the playoffs.''

If you've picked a celebrity for captain, then you've probably made the wrong decision. If you've picked a youngster you hope will become a real leader, then you had better have a great group of veterans to help him, as Dallas did with Derian Hatcher.

''I remember looking into the eyes of Steve Yzerman one year when we faced them before they won the Stanley Cup,'' Modano recalls, ''and what I saw was more than just an intense player, it was the look of a confident leader, a player who wasn't going to be denied.

Mario Lemieux inspired the Pittsburgh Penguins with his ability ot overcome adversity.

''After seeing that, I knew that was a big part of being able to win a Stanley Cup.''

Being able to show his team the way is the sign of the best captains. Take Mario Lemieux, who was a leader to all of the Penguins when they saw what it took for him to be able to play -- straightening up his bad back enough to skate and having to rely on a clubhouse boy to tie his skate laces for him. And then seeing him gut it out on the ice was real captain's courage.

''Just to see what it took for Mario to go on the ice with his bad back and all of the other injuries he had was reason enough for the rest of us to give everything we had,'' Penguins teammate Rick Tocchet told me.

It's easy to distinguish the great captains like Yzerman, Stevens, Messier, Carolina's Ron Francis, Sakic or Ray Bourque. They stand out. They make people around them better. They make them accountable.

And it doesn't take a guaranteed win speech. It's all about the team.

''If you have a company, you can go out and buy up the best sales people, the best writers, the best carpenters,'' Devils GM Lou Lamoriello once told me, ''but unless you have a plan and work together as a team -- with a leader behind the bench and on the ice -- you won't achieve your ultimate goal to be the best.''

It's like the old phrase: The singers sing, the dancers dance and the plumbers plumb. In the NHL, captains combine all of those skills with a touch of class, courage and ultimately the feeling of a champion.

Larry Wigge has covered the NHL since 1969. He knows what it takes to lead.