The Medicine Hat Tigers announced Tuesday that Willie Desjardins is heading to the NHL's Dallas Stars. Of course, Willie has ties to Lethbridge as he played with the Broncos between 1975 and 1977. Here's the official release from the Tigers on Willie's departure:
Medicine Hat Tigers announced today Willie Desjardins will join the coaching staff of the National Hockey League’s Dallas Stars as associate coach to Marc Crawford.
“Our entire organization is very happy for Wil,” stated Tigers’ president/governor Darrell Maser.
“No one is more deserving of this opportunity than Willie. It speaks to the quality of coach and person he is to make the transition directly from major junior hockey to the NHL. Dallas has made an excellent choice for their organization,” said Maser.During his eight seasons with the Tigers, Desjardins lead the club to two appearances in the Memorial Cup in 2004 and 2007. The Tigers captured four consecutive eastern conference titles from 2003-04 to 2006-07 while under Desjardin’s tutelage. For his efforts, Desjardins was named the WHL and CHL Coach of the Year in 2005-06.
“He has been the cornerstone of this franchise for eight years and certainly is the best coach this organization has seen,” stated Maser.
Desjardins appeared behind the Tigers bench in 559 games, posting a record of 323 wins, 176 losses, 60 OTL/SL/T for a 63.15 winning percentage. He leads all former Tigers’ coaches in games and wins while being the longest serving coach in Tiger’s history.
The 53-year-old native of Climax, SK, served as head coach for the Canadian National Junior Team at the 2010 World Junior Hockey Championships and as an assistant coach to Pat Quinn the previous year. He also was named as a coach for the Subway Super Series, an all-star series vs. Russian Selects, for the past three seasons, as a WHL assistant coach in 2007 and WHL head coach in 2008 and 2009.
“At this time, we would like to thank Willie and his family for all they have done, not only for this franchise but also for the community of Medicine Hat. It has been an honour to have had the opportunity to work with Willie,” concluded Maser.
Willie Desjardins commented, “Not many people in their lifetime get the experience I had while in Medicine Hat. It was from the city. I don’t feel this was just another city to play hockey. It is THE city to play hockey. I had such exceptional players to work with. They were a big impact on me. It was all about character and what they wanted to accomplish. Then you go to our staff and the people I got to work with everyday. The coaches, Shaun and Krugs, J.F., Scottie, Mikki and Sticks made it was such a great environment to come to the rink. The guys were committed to winning and committed to working as a team. It made the situation unique.”
“Then you come to the ownership of the Tigers, which is outstanding. You won’t find better ownership in the league. Darrell and Brent understand the game real well and are really committed to winning. I had other opportunities to leave in the past and they were the reason I stayed because this was such a good place to work. If I didn’t enjoy working here it would have been easy to leave. Winning begins at the top and they were the ones that got it going and I was just part of it,” said Desjardins.
Pat
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This is the best news I have heard in 8 years! I suspect and hope that there will be many lean years ahead for the Tigers. YES!!
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