Lindy Ruff spent Monday night at home after checking a few items off his honey-do list, which included cleaning leaves from his garden and making sure his miniature snowplow was working. Later, he grabbed a steak dinner with his son, Brett, at Kennedy’s Cove near their home in Clarence.

Sure enough, a few old friends and acquaintances stopped to shake his hand at the restaurant and wish him well with the Dallas Stars. Ruff, 55, played and coached in Buffalo for more than 25 years and guided the Sabres through the greatest period in franchise history.

Ruff’s success, which included four trips to the conference finals and one to the Stanley Cup finals in 15 seasons, is often overlooked by people who remember him missing the postseason four times in his final six seasons. He had more wins (571) – and more losses (432) – than any Buffalo bench.

He made his mark on Buffalo, and Buffalo left its mark on him, before losses caught up to him. It’s hard to fathom him ever leaving the region for good.

“I don’t even need to say anything about this city,” Ruff said. “Just great people. It was a great place to play and an even better place to coach. And it’s still a great place to live. Wherever the future lies, it lies, but when you spend 30 years in one city, you’ve always got a soft spot for it.”

Good man, Lindy Ruff.

It was nice to see him in good spirits Tuesday. He certainly hasn’t lost his sense of humor or his gift for making people feel comfortable. He also hasn’t lost his passion for the game or his ability to guide a team. The Stars are tied for the NHL’s best record and lead the league in scoring.

The Stars wasted little time showing why they have emerged as a superpower early in the season. Fifty-one seconds into the game, Valeri Nichushkin grabbed a loose puck and wheeled around Linus Ullmark for an easy goal. The Stars weren’t at their finest, but they were more polished in a 3-1 victory in First Niagara Center.

Ruff was on his toes after Buffalo scored an apparent power-play goal to tie the game with 6:15 remaining. Tyler Ennis put himself offside on the play. Ruff won the ensuing challenge, and Sam Reinhart’s goal was taken off the board. Obviously, he learned a thing or two in Buffalo about No Goal.

Dallas is strikingly similar to Buffalo teams he coached to the conference finals in consecutive seasons beginning in 2005-06. The Sabres were strong down the middle with Chris Drury, Daniel Briere and Derek Roy. They had a solid defense corps, sound goaltending and an abundance of speed and depth.

“It really is like that team,” Ruff said. “We have three or four lines, and all of them can score. It makes us dangerous, especially when you go on the road and teams want to shut down your top lines. Our secondary scoring has been good.”

The Stars have true playmaking centers in Tyler Seguin and Jason Spezza. Jamie Benn has evolved into one of the best players in the NHL. Young defenseman John Klingberg, a former fifth-round pick, is blossoming the way Brian Campbell did after the Sabres selected him in the sixth round.

It’s all too familiar.

Dallas is playing a responsible two-way style that was customary in Buffalo under Ruff. He was criticized for being too tough on his players toward the end, and they stopped listening. His relentless approach can grow stale. But other players have responded to a similar message in Dallas.

“It’s good that he’s really hard on me and good that he harps on making my game a two-way game,” said Seguin, who scored the clincher Tuesday into an empty net. “I can’t really tell you the last time he said, ‘You had a good goal’ or ‘You had a good night tonight.’ I’ve had games where I had a hat trick, and the first thing is being taken into his office for a D-zone clip. That’s the kind of coach he is, but that’s also a winning coach in today’s league.”

For years, mostly when the Sabres had Dominik Hasek in net and lacked talent elsewhere, Ruff was criticized for not understanding offense. And when they became the high-flying Sabres, a small but speedy group that was made for shooting first and asking questions later, fans whined about Ruff not emphasizing defense.

It was ridiculous.

Ruff has 667 career wins, third-most among active coaches and eighth-most among all-time coaches. In Buffalo, he won 361 more games than second-place Scotty Bowman. He has 57 postseason victories, nearly half the franchise’s total, while coaching less than a third of their games.

The guy can coach.

“As soon as you get too good offensively, you can’t coach defense,” Ruff said with a laugh. “It’s funny how that works.”

The Stars’ early success is an indication of what Ruff can do when given talented players who embrace his style and tenacity. They added veteran leaders such as Patrick Sharp and Johnny Oduya who learned what it took to win the Cup when both were in Chicago.

Dallas these days is playing like Buffalo did nine and 10 years ago. In 2005-06, the Sabres pulled everything together and were a leg infection to defenseman Jay McKee away from beating the Hurricanes in the Eastern Conference finals. Carolina prevailed in seven games and ended up winning the Cup.

To me, that was the year they should have won it all, not the season that followed. The Sabres led the league in scoring and had the best record in the NHL in 2006-07, but the chemistry from the previous year wasn’t quite the same. They still haven’t recovered from mismanagement that followed.

The great injustice in Ruff getting fired wasn’t, strangely enough, him getting fired. It was him getting fired before Darcy Regier, who should have been long gone. Regier, despite reaffirming his incompetence after Terry Pegula handed him an open checkbook, weaseled his way into sticking around longer.

Years before Ruff was fired, I often wondered what he could accomplish if the Sabres hired an architect who surrounded him with great players. Remember, the Sabres’ after the 2004-05 lockout was a stroke of good fortune, not a stroke of genius, after rules were changed to open up the game.

Now, I know.

Stars GM Jim Nill, instrumental in Detroit’s success before he took over in Dallas, has built a very good roster for a very good coach. Ruff is getting the results he anticipated through the first quarter of the season from players who respect him. Even though he’s working far away, he’s never far from home.

“You bump into people, friends and people you’ve seen,” Ruff said. “I was impressed because there’s a genuine excitement about the team again, which is great. They’re talking about the team being fun to watch. I think it’s great.”

email: bgleason@buffnews.com