owner, the caps held their first practice in four years without bruce boudreaux. boudreaux s team is going to have to be sharp. reporter: the popular coach was told early monday morning that he was fired. almost four years to the day he replaced glenn hamlin as head coach. amid rumors boudreaux had lost control of the locker room, gm george mcafee felt it was time for a change. this was simply a case of the players were no longer responding to bruce. reporter: the change comes two days after the caps lost 5- 1 to an injury-riddled buffalo team, leaving the players with a sense of guilt that gabby had to take the fall. we weren t playing as well as we should have. reporter: shouldered with the challenge of getting the caps back on track is a man very familiar to the organization and long time fans. dale hunter played in washington for 1212 seasons. his last four, he served as captain and is one of four capitals to have his number retired. for hunter, this was an of