Maybe the teacher you encountered had some "rogue" or "rebel" quality about him that you represented by seeing him to look like the other guy. There's the notion of "crazy wisdom" in Zen, for example, where some teachers do seemingly unenlightened things to shock others out of their unconsciousness, a variation on "skillful means."

All of this doesn't necessarily reflect back on the physical person. IMO it is more likely that he was used as a symbol for something than you actually connecting with that specific person.