Patrick Roy and Larry Robinson were two of the greatest players Pat Burns ever coached and both of them expressed some degree of relief Friday that their friend's suffering has come to an end, but also regret that he was not able to join them in the Hockey Hall of Fame before his passing.

Burns died Friday in Sherbrooke after a long battle with cancer, less than two weeks after the Hall of Fame inductions were held without him.

His exclusion caused a huge outcry in the hockey community considering Burns is the only man to ever win the Jack Adams Award as coach of the year for three different teams and is all but assured of being inducted one day.

That outrage was made all the more painful with Burns' passing.

"He's a great man and deserves all the accolades," Robinson, a Hall of Fame defenceman who played for Burns with the Canadiens and coached alongside him in New Jersey, told CTV Montreal on Friday. "The only one thing I wish he could have been around to see would be his name inducted into the Hall of Fame. I think we screwed up big time by not having him put into the Hall of Fame this year. I hope one day we do see his name there, because he's done a lot for hockey."

Roy shared many fond memories of his former coach with the Canadiens, including his gratitude that Burns gave him his shot to become a true No. 1 goalie after years of platooning with Brian Hayward.

But the Hall of Fame snub also came up as Roy addressed reporters after coaching his Quebec Remparts of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League on Friday night in Quebec City.

"He will be in the Hall of Fame one day," Roy said in French. "It would have been nice to see him make it while he was alive."

Roy was with the Canadiens throughout Burns' tenure as head coach from 1988 to 1992, and he said the gruff former cop had a knack for getting him to play his best.

"He was a coach who could be hard on his players, but on the inside he was a great human being," Roy said. "I have great memories of him for all the times he came to see me and said, ‘Casseau (Roy's nickname in French), I need you at the start of the game because I'm not sure the guys are sharp.' That really motivated me, and I liked it when he came and talked to me like that. So he found a way to get me to perform."

Burns' persona as a tough-as-nails coach was a good representation of the man as well, Robinson said. And he proved it through his courageous fight against the cancer he ultimately succumbed to Friday.

"The reason he only passed away today is that he's a fighter," said Robinson, who lost his brother to cancer. "Any lesser man would have been gone a lot longer (ago). But his will to live and his will to go on and fight this horrible, horrible, horrible disease epitomizes the type of person Pat is. We'll all miss him, but he is in a much better place right now."

Roy also expressed relief that the painful suffering Burns experienced in his final days were now over.

"He was fighting this for a long time, and no one likes to see someone they love suffering," Roy said. "When he came to my jersey retirement he whispered in my ear, ‘It's finished for me.' You could see it. It's not that he wanted to move on, but he had accepted his fate."

Roy said he learned many lessons from Burns that help him today in his role as a junior coach.

"I loved his enthusiasm," he said. "He had a sharp tongue and he was intense behind the bench. But what I liked a lot was he had flair, he could see what was going on during a game and really manage his bench well. He made it an art form to send out the right guys at the right moment."

Robinson, an assistant coach with the New Jersey Devils, said Burns was a hockey man to his final days. The Devils are off to a poor start to the season, and in spite of his plight Burns was almost more concerned with that than his own health.

"In his last days he was fighting pain and fighting to stay alive with this stupid disease, and he's more worried with how our team is doing and the fact we got off to this horrible start," Robinson said. "He loved the game, he loved the people he worked for and worked with and hockey in general. He’s a great man and deserves all the accolades."

Though Robinson only played one season under Burns, it was enough for him to have a lasting memory of the man's softer side.

He remembered a game during the 1988-89 season, Robinson's last with the Canadiens, where a puck was coming toward him at the blue line.

"As I started down to take a slap-shot the puck kind of bounced a changed directions and I told myself, ‘Well, either I'm going to take a swing at it or I'm going to fall flat on my face.' Sure enough, I fell flat on my face," Robinson remembered with a laugh. "They took off on a breakaway or a 2-on-1, and I looked over to the bench and there was Burnsie. His face was red as a beet. He was laughing so hard, I thought he was going to pee his pants. That's a memory that will remain with me a long, long time. You've got to be able to laugh at yourself, you've got to be able to laugh at others and you've got to enjoy yourself. That's the way he was.

"He demanded a lot from us, but he also demanded a lot from himself. That's the way Burnsie was. He's a great man and he's going to be missed."