Ted Nolan

Ted Nolan (born April 7, 1958, in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario) is a First Nations Canadian. Nolan is a former NHL left-wing hockey player, and currently a coach. He is the father of Manitoba Moose player Brandon Nolan.

Playing Career

As a player, he played for the Ontario Hockey Association's Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds, the Kansas City Red Wings of the Central Hockey League, and the Adirondack Red Wings, Rochester Americans and Baltimore Skipjacks of the American Hockey League. He also played for the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Detroit Red Wings of the National Hockey League from the early through to the mid-1980s.

Coaching Career

He became head coach of the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds in 1988, as a mid-season replacement and coached there until the end of the 1994 season. Nolan led the Greyhounds to the three consecutive Memorial Cup tournament berths, winning the Canadian national junior championship in 1993.

NHL Debut

He was hired before the 1994 regular season as an assistant coach by the Hartford Whalers for one season before accepting the position of head coach of the NHL's Buffalo Sabres where he had his best success. In his second season in Buffalo, he led the team to a strong regular season, culminating in the Northeast Division title. He was rewarded with the Jack Adams Trophy as the league's top coach.

However his relationships with superstar goaltender Dominik Hasek and general manager John Muckler were strained, with Hasek actually stating in an interview during 1997 NHL Awards Ceremony that "it would be better for me if he (Nolan) did not return". Muckler, fresh off of being voted the NHL's 1996-97 Executive of the Year, was the first casualty of this toxic situation and was fired prior to the 1997-98 season. Darcy Regier, Muckler's replacement as GM, was given the option to choose his own coach. Rather than fire Nolan, whose two-year contract had just expired, Regier offered him a one-year extension. After such a successful 1996 season working with what was widely considered sub-par talent (Hasek aside), Nolan found the offer insulting and rejected it.

After the NHL

Following his departure from Buffalo, Nolan was offered NHL coaching jobs in 1997 by the Tampa Bay Lightning (head coach) and in 1998 by the New York Islanders (assistant coach). Nolan declined on both offers. He has not been offered an NHL coaching job since then and speculations as to why range from outright racism to a perceived fear that Nolan is a "GM Killer" based on his acrimonious working relationship with former boss Muckler.

In 2003, Nolan was in talks to become the coach for the Toronto Toros of the new World Hockey Association, but it never got past talks, and the new WHA never formed. As of December 26, 2005, he has not since been hired again in the NHL, but on 26 April 2005, he was hired as the coach and director of hockey operations for the Moncton Wildcats of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. The Wildcats will be hosting the 2006 Memorial Cup.

On December 16, 2005, Nolan was the victim of racist harassment during a Wildcats road game against the Chicoutimi Sagueneens. Fans in the stands shouted racial slurs at him and directed gestures such as the "tomahawk chop" and shooting a bow and arrow towards him as he stood behind the Moncton bench. Fans continued to taunt Nolan outside the arena after the game as he boarded the team bus with his players. The incident, he said later, left him shaking with anger and humiliation; while the fans' behaviour was condemned both by the QMJHL commissioner and Sagueneens management, Nolan felt that he had still to receive a formal apology from the Chicoutimi organization. As a result of the events that had transpired in Chicoutimi, Quebec, he referred to the Saguenay as being the "Alabama" of the QMJHL.

• Ted Nolan's Foundation [1]