PITTSBURGH — Sitting in his Las Vegas hotel room on Thursday morning, Dan Bylsma finally broke down.
In Ray Shero, who died Wednesday at the age of 62, Bylsma had lost so much more than a friend.
Through the tears, Bylsma, the Seattle Kraken’s head coach, didn’t hold back.
“Today,” Bylsma said, “I feel like I’ve lost my hockey dad.”
Shero and Bylsma made it to the hockey mountaintop together on June 12, 2009, when the Pittsburgh Penguins dethroned the mighty Detroit Red Wings in Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final at Detroit’s Joe Louis Arena. Not a day goes by, Bylsma said, that he doesn’t think of that night.
And not a day goes by that he doesn’t think of Shero, who died in Arizona after a brief illness, Minnesota Wild GM Bill Guerin said.
Bylsma was among those who didn’t know Shero was sick until after he died.
“Not many people knew how ill he was,” Bylsma said. “Only a couple of family members and a couple of friends. That was it. From what I hear, that’s what Ray wanted. He had this huge circle because everyone loved Ray. But only a handful of people knew. I am absolutely devastated.”
Bylsma was a relative unknown in coaching circles in 2008, when Shero came away impressed with the former player in an interview and hired him to coach the Penguins’ AHL affiliate. A few months later, on Feb. 15, 2009, Shero fired Penguins coach Mike Therrien and put Bylsma in charge of a young team that reached the Stanley Cup Final in 2008 but stumbled badly during the next season. Bylsma wasn’t necessarily the long-term plan for Shero, but the general manager came to realize he had found the perfect coach for young Sidney Crosby and the Penguins.
They claimed a championship a few months later, and a lifelong bond was formed.
What does Bylsma owe to Shero?
“Oh, let me see,” Bylsma said. “Everything. Only everything.”
Bylsma made it to the NHL as a player, but his true calling was as a head coach. Shero saw it immediately, and, even as the Penguins began to stumble in playoffs after that 2009 triumph, he never blamed Bylsma.
Shero’s Penguins bosses wanted Bylsma fired in 2014. He said no.
So, Shero and Bylsma were fired on the same day in 2014 — two crucial figures in franchise history tied together until the end.
“When you’re a player, there’s always a coach who stands up for you, believes in you, gives you an opportunity,” Bylsma said. “It’s the same way in the world of coaching. And for me, Ray Shero was that guy. He always stood up for me, believed in me.”
Above all else, Shero believed in loyalty. He took the fall because of his loyalty to Bylsma. He remained most loyal to his trusted assistant general managers, including Guerin, Jason Botterill and Tom Fitzgerald. Fittingly, Botterill made the call to Bylsma to tell him about Shero’s death on Wednesday.
“He was the one who mentored all of us,” Bylsma said. “And he did it so very well. I don’t know if people even understand what kind of an incredible general manager and mentor Ray was.”
Shero was known for his biting sense of humor, willingness to take risks and fierce loyalty that came before everything else.
All of those qualities are present in Bylsma’s favorite memory with Shero.
“We had just won the Cup in Detroit (in 2009) and were just standing on the bench because we didn’t really know what to do,” Bylsma said. “We were thinking about all the changes that we made, how incredible those few months were. It finally occurred to Ray that we had both been coaches involved with USA Hockey at some point in our lives. At the time, he owned a Level 5 coach card for USA Hockey. I only had a Level 3 coach card. So, we’re taking it all in. Ray then leans over to me and says, ‘Just remember, you only have a Level 3 card. I’m still more qualified to coach this team than you are.’”
Then, they laughed.
Sidney Crosby on the passing of Ray Shero. pic.twitter.com/1YSh8n3oy5
— Pittsburgh Penguins (@penguins) April 9, 2025
Shero could be brash when necessary. He always had a soft spot for Bylsma, though.
When Team USA lost to Canada in the 2014 Olympic semifinal in Sochi, Russia, Bylsma was the Americans’ coach. Shero was their assistant general manager.
“People are giving Dan a hard time,” Shero said on his first day back in Pittsburgh after the loss. “We just lost to the best f—ing team ever f—ing assembled 1-0, and people are giving him a hard time? He’s a great coach.”
A few months later, they both moved on from Pittsburgh. Shero surfaced as New Jersey Devils general manager, while Bylsma went on to coach the Buffalo Sabres and the Kraken, with a stint in the AHL in between.
Both enjoyed varying levels of success since their Penguins days, but it seemed that they were always better together.
Shero’s father, Fred, the legendary coach of the Philadelphia Flyers’ “Broadstreet Bullies,” also died young, at 65. He famously said to the 1974 Flyers before they claimed the Stanley Cup for the first time, “Win today, and we walk together forever.”
His son believed in those words. Bylsma did, too.
And on that night in Detroit, Shero and Bylsma did indeed walk together.
“And what made things really special in Pittsburgh, it was this family atmosphere that started because of him,” Bylsma said. “When I think to those times in Pittsburgh, I think of the togetherness. The players, the staff, the coaches. Everyone. That was who we were. We were all in it together. We fought together. Won won together. We lost together. And no matter what, we all stuck together. And that, I assure you, was because of Ray Shero. That was who he was, the philosophy he believed in. Loyalty.”
All of these years later, coaching a team that didn’t even exist in 2009, Bylsma’s mind always goes back to that night when he and Shero conquered the hockey world.
“The Pittsburgh Penguins were the Pittsburgh Penguins because of him,” Bylsma said. “We were champions because of him, the team he built, and more importantly, the family culture that he developed. It was because of him. It was special and helped us become champions.”
Together. Forever.
(Photo: Dave Sandford / NHLI via Getty Images)