Jim Bedard

Jim Bedard
Date of birth	November 14, 1956
place of birth	Niagara Falls , Ontario , Canada
size	183 cm
Weight	81 kg
position	goalkeeper
Catch hand	Left
Draft
NHL Amateur Draft	1976 , 6th round, 91st position Washington Capitals
WHA Amateur Draft	1976 , 9th lap, 106th position Edmonton Oilers
Career stations
1972-1973	Welland Sabers
1973-1976	Sudbury Wolves
1976-1977	Dayton Gems
1977-1979	Washington Capitals
1979-1980	Dayton Gems
1980-1982	TPS Turku
1982-1983	Ketterä Imatra
1983-1987	TuTo Turku
1987-1989	HPK Hämeenlinna
1989-1992	Kiekko-67 Turku
1992-1993	Turku HT
1993-1994	TuTo Turku

James Arthur Bedard (born November 14, 1956 in Niagara Falls , Ontario ) is a former Canadian ice hockey goalie and current goalie coach of the Detroit Red Wings from the National Hockey League .

Career

Jim Bedard began his career in lower class youth leagues before moving to the Sudbury Wolves in 1973 in the Canadian Junior League OHA , which was renamed OMJHL a year later. In Sudbury Bedard was able to convince with good performances. In 1975 the team moved into the semi-finals of the playoffs and in the following year they only had to admit defeat to the Hamilton Fincups in the final . Bedard received after the 1975/76 season also the Dave Pinkney Trophy for the fewest goals conceded and was elected to the First All-Star Team of the league.

Through his achievements Bedard had also drawn the attention of the professional teams to himself, whereupon he was selected by the Washington Capitals in the NHL Amateur Draft 1976 in the sixth round in position 91 and at the same time by the Edmonton Oilers in the WHA Amateur Draft in the tenth round in position 106 was drafted . Bedard decided to play for the Washington Capitals, but spent the following season in the IHL with the Dayton Gems .

For the 1977/78 season he was appointed to the NHL squad of the Capitals and played most of the games as a regular goalkeeper, but was only able to win eleven of 43 games. The following year he formed the Washington goalkeeper team with Gary Inness and Bernie Wolfe , but the season was almost as unsuccessful as the previous one. In the following season Bedard was no longer part of the NHL squad of the Capitals and played the 1979/80 season with several teams in lower-class leagues.

In the summer of 1980 he moved to Finland, where he was signed by TPS Turku from the SM-liiga . With TPS he finished third in the league in 1981 and was runner-up in 1982. 1982/83 he played for Ketterä Imatra in the Finnish second division before he spent four seasons with TuTo Hockey in the second division. In 1987 Bedard moved within the league to HPK Hämeenlinna with whom he rose to the SM-Liiga and was a goalkeeper there for a year. He then went back to the second division and played three years at KooKoo and one season at third division Turku HT before he played one last season as a goalkeeper of TuTo Hockey and ended his career in 1994.

Bedard then returned to North America and was hired in the summer of 1994 as a goalkeeping coach by the Niagara Falls Thunder from the Canadian junior league OHL . The largely unsuccessful team relocated in 1996 and called themselves Erie Otters from then on . Bedard followed the team and stayed another year as an assistant coach before he was hired in 1997 by the Detroit Red Wings of the NHL as an advisor for goalkeeping matters. In this position he supervised Chris Osgood , Manny Legace , Curtis Joseph and Dominik Hašek in the following years and the Red Wings won the Stanley Cup in 1998 and 2002 .

In 2002 Bedard was officially named goalkeeping coach for the Red Wings. Since the lockout and the failure of the 2004/05 season , Detroit has always been one of the three teams with the lowest conceded goal average in the following three seasons and in 2007/08 Chris Osgood and Dominik Hašek could win the William M. Jennings Trophy for the fewest goals conceded. So he also had a share in the renewed Stanley Cup victory in the summer of 2008. In addition to looking after the NHL goalkeepers, Bedard is also responsible for the goalkeepers of the Red Wings AHL farm team, the Grand Rapids Griffins .

Achievements and Awards

As a player

• 1976 OMJHL First All-Star Team
• 1976 Dave Pinkney Trophy

As a trainer

• 1998 Stanley Cup winner with the Detroit Red Wings (as goalkeeping coach)
• 2002 Stanley Cup winner with the Detroit Red Wings (as goalkeeping coach)
• 2008 Stanley Cup winner with the Detroit Red Wings (as goalkeeping coach)

Web links

• Jim Bedard at hockeydb.com (English)
• Jim Bedard at hockeydraftcentral.com
• Jim Bedard at hockeygoalies.org