NEWS PHOTO JAMES TUBB
Medicine Hat Tigers head coach Willie Desjardins watches a video celebrating his 500th WHL win ahead of a 3-2, shootout win over the Calgary Hitmen at Co-op Place on Jan. 18. Desjardins recorded his 500th win as a Tigers head coach on Tuesday, a 5-3 win over the Saskatoon Blades.
jtubb@medicinehatnews.com@ReporterTubb
Back where his Western Hockey League coaching career began, Willie Desjardins was able to celebrate a milestone that means more to him than he could describe.
The Medicine Hat Tigers head coach celebrated his 500th WHL win on Jan. 10, an 8-1 rout of the Red Deer Rebels. That win made him the 12th head coach to reach the 500-win mark in WHL history.
Over a month and 10 wins later, Desjardins recorded his 500th win while coaching the orange and black, a milestone he holds in higher regard. Tuesday’s 5-3 win at Saskatoon over the Blades, a city where he picked up his first 10 WHL wins as an interim coach in 1997-98 before joining Medicine Hat in 2002-03, made him just the fourth head coach to reach 500 wins with one WHL franchise.
“It’s always more special when you can do it for an organization, and it’s even more special when it’s this organization,” Desjardins said. “These fans and this city, it means a lot to me. It meant way more to me to get 500 wins for this team than the 500 in my career.”
The win also came on his 68th birthday, which invoked a rendition of ‘Happy Birthday’ that captain Oasiz Wiesblatt says he and associate coach Joe Frazer led the vocals for. He was proud of his coach for reaching that milestone and how he celebrated it.
“Just speaking of how good of person he is, he gives his 500-win puck to (Tigers room attendant) Keegan (Kolody),” Wiesblatt said. “That’s amazing to me and just speaks to his high character and what a great person he is.”
Frazer, who played for Desjardins and has worked alongside him since the franchise’s winningest coach returned in 2019-20, says the longevity shows a lot of loyalty from all sides.
“The loyalty from ownership and from Willie, especially in today’s world, it’s pretty remarkable to get that many wins with one franchise,” Frazer said. “You look at all the banners that are hung up in Co-op Place, he’s been a part of a lot of them.
“So just an incredible accomplishment. We always say Willie is an unbelievable coach, but the person he is, that is what makes this place great. Guys want to play for him, guys want to work with him and they want to win with him.”
Desjardins is looking for his third championship with the Tigers, coaching them to the 2004 and 2007 titles that have the franchise tied for the second-most in WHL history with five.
He balks at the idea of being the face of the Tigers. Instead, Desjardins says what he’s done and the 500 wins with the club shows how special Medicine Hat is and how lucky he has been to be behind the Tigers bench.
“It says just a lot about the franchise too, because there’s always ups and downs in your career and they can move on, they can take different guys, but they haven’t. They’ve always stayed with me,” Desjardins said. “So that’s pretty special. With our fans, our fans have been good and I’m just lucky to be able to be part of that. It’s a special place.”
