Doug Shedden - Coaching Career

Coaching Career

Shedden's Career as Head Coach started when he was hired to take over the Wichita Thunder in 1992. After leading Wichita to back-to-back CHL Championships in 1993-94 and 1994–95, Shedden coached several teams in UHL, CHL and ECHL before becoming the Head Coach for St. John's Maple Leafs of the AHL, where he guided the team to their best record for wins in franchise history in their final year in St. John's.

After that Shedden was hired by Finnish SM-liiga team HIFK to replace Dave King, who had decided to go to Metallurg Magnitogorsk of the Russian Superleague instead of HIFK. Shedden's single season at the helm of HIFK was good and the team fought its way to the Bronze Medal game. HIFK however lost to HPK.

After his debut in the SM-liiga, Shedden was acquired by HIFK's local rivals Jokerit, where Shedden made an impact during his first season as the Head Coach of the team. Jokerit survived all the way to the Finals but were defeated by Kärpät. Shedden's second season as the Head Coach of Jokerit was a bit of a disappointment. Jokerit did advance to the playoffs, but were defeated four games to three by Espoo Blues in the Semifinals even though Jokerit had a 3–1 lead in the best-of-seven series.

The 2007–08 Season with Jokerit was Shedden's last, as he was contracted by EV Zug, a Swiss professional ice hockey team playing in the Swiss Nationalliga A.

During his time at Jokerit, Shedden was also contracted by the Finnish National Team as head coach to replace Erkka Westerlund. Under Shedden's coaching, Finland won the bronze medal in the 2008 World Championships. Shedden's one-year contract ended after 2008 World Championships and he was replaced by his assistant coach, Jukka Jalonen.

In Finland, he made many new friends and proved to be a good coach. Another person was Tim Stapleton, one of his players, who left with Doug Shedden but instead of coaching in Zug, he went to play with the Toronto Marlies of the AHL.