Todd McLellan
Todd McLellan ( born October 3, 1967 in Melville, Saskatchewan ) is a retired Canadian professional ice hockey player and current coach. During his career, he graduated in the 1987/88 season five games for the New York Islanders in the National Hockey League. Since June 2008 he has been head coach of the San Jose Sharks in the NHL.
Career
Todd McLellan began his career in 1983 at the Saskatoon Blades in the Canadian Junior Football League WHL. After a solid debut season, he was able to increase and came in his second year, within 41 games to 50 points scorer. The following season was missing McLellan mostly due to injury, but was able to draw attention to themselves in 13 games, so it chose the New York Islanders in the NHL Entry Draft in 1986 in the fifth round at position 104 in the playoffs with nine goals. McLellan remained another year at the blades and played with 34 goals and 39 assists, his best season. 1987/88 he played for the first time in the pros and spent most of the season with the Springfield Indians, the farm team of the Islanders of the American Hockey League, but also came five times in the National Hockey League action in which he scored a goal. He stayed a year with the Indians, was no longer appointed by the Islanders but in the NHL squad.
He then in 1989 moved to Europe, where he was active in the Dutch Eredivisie as player-coach of Utrecht Rheem Racers. In the years 1991 and 1992 he led the team each for winning the Dutch Championship. After a successful title defense in 1992 McLellan finally ended his playing career and returned to North America. A year later, he took over as coach at the North Battleford North Stars of the Saskatchewan Junior League unterklassigen Canadian Junior Hockey League, before he head coach of the Swift Current Broncos in the Western Hockey League first class in 1994. After a weak first season, McLellan has positioned the Broncos among the top teams in the league, the success in the playoffs, however, failed to materialize. In addition to his duties as a coach, he was also general manager of the team in 1996 and in 1997 received the Lloyd Saunders Memorial Trophy as WHL functionary of the year. After leading the team in the 1999/2000 season to 47 wins, the second-best figure in the history of the franchise, he was awarded the Dunc McCallum Memorial Trophy as the best coach of the WHL. At the turn of 1999/2000 he had charge of the Canadian U20 national team as assistant coach at the U20 World Junior Championships in Sweden under head coach Claude Julien and won the bronze medal.
McLellan decided after a successful season for the seniors to go and took over the Cleveland Lumberjacks of the International Hockey League. However, the league disbanded in 2001 and McLellan moved to the AHL, where he was head coach of the Houston Aeros. The franchise, which played its first season in the AHL, he was able to perform in the playoffs and in the Conference Finals, where they, however, the Chicago Wolves documents. The regular season 2002/ 03 ended the Aeros with 47 wins from 80 games in second place in the Western Conference and eventually won the AHL playoffs, in Conference Finals after the against the Grand Rapids Griffins and the Calder Cup final against Hamilton Bulldogs had to go the full distance of seven games. The title defense did not succeed the team. Instead, the team slipped in the league from clear and could not directly qualify for the playoffs themselves, so you had to play in the qualifying round against the Cincinnati Mighty Ducks and lost. In the season 2004/ 05 the performance of the Aeros improved again, but they did not go beyond the first playoff round.
In the summer of 2005, he joined the coaching staff of the Detroit Red Wings to Mike Babcock, where he was responsible, along with Paul A. MacLean and Jim Bedard as an assistant coach for the offensive department of the team. McLellan had. Especially through the establishment of the power play in the success of the team that was one of the three best teams in the NHL outnumbered 2005/ 06 and 2007/ 08 In 2008, he finally won with the Red Wings in the Stanley Cup Finals against the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Just a week after the triumph McLellan received his first head coaching job in the NHL, as presented him the San Jose Sharks as the successor to Ron Wilson and the seventh head coach in the history of the franchise. As assistants he chose Todd Richards, Trent Yawney, and Jay Woodcroft from. McLellan introduced himself in his new role at first good one. In pre-season he gave the Sharks by a new attack-minded basic tactics a completely new face, after they had previously set mostly defensively over the years. This paid off, as the team - claiming in the top league and after 30 games season outdid the start record of the Boston Bruins from the season 1929/30 - from the beginning of the season. As a reward for his work of Canadians was appointed head coach of the All-Stars in the Western Conference at the 57th NHL All-Star Game. This was previously only one other head coach Doug MacLean succeeded in 1996 in his first season.
Awards and achievements
- 2003 Calder Cup win with the Houston Aeros
- 2003 Best Minor League coach of the season (awarded by The Hockey News )
- 2008 Stanley Cup win with the Detroit Red Wings ( as assistant coach )
- 2009 head coach at the NHL All-Star Game
- 2012 head coach at the NHL All-Star Game
Career Stats
As a player
( Key to Career statistics: Sp or GP = Games Played, T or G = goals scored, V or A = achieved assists; Pts or Pts = scored points scorer, SM or PIM = received penalty minutes, / - = Plus / Minus balance sheet; PP = scored majority gates; SH = scored shorthanded goals, GW = achieved victory gates; Play-downs/Relegation 1 )
As a coach
(Legend to coach statistics: Sp or GC = Total Games; W or S = scored victories, L or N = scored Losses, T or U = scored draw; OTL or OTN = scored Losses after Overtime or Shootout; Pts or Pts = points scored, Win % = winning percentage, result = round reached in the play- offs )