Patrick Williams, TheAHL.com Features Writer
Departing Hershey Bears head coach Todd Nelson made the most of his three seasons with the AHL’s senior-most franchise. Along with the pig roasts, team-bonding outings and memorable quips came a lot of wins.
Nelson, who led the Bears to back-to-back Calder Cup championships, left Hershey on June 20 to become an assistant coach with the Pittsburgh Penguins. After parts of 11 seasons as an AHL head coach in which his 450 regular-season wins rank him fifth all-time, Nelson is going back to the NHL.
The 56-year-old Nelson, who had already won the Calder Cup three times – once each as a player, assistant coach and head coach – before coming to Hershey in 2022, departs the Bears with a stack of impressive achievements. He went 141-53-12-10 in 216 regular-season games, his .704 point percentage the best among any head coach in Hershey’s 88 seasons in the AHL.
The Bears won the 2023 Calder Cup in Nelson’s first season with the team, a wild, back-and-forth seven-game battle with the Coachella Valley Firebirds that went to a Game 7 overtime finish. As a follow-up, he took them to a 53-14-0-5 record in 2023-24 and won the Louis A.R. Pieri Memorial Award as the AHL’s most outstanding coach. The Bears again defeated Coachella Valley in the Calder Cup Finals, this time in six games. And while a bid fell short to become the first team to win three consecutive Calder Cup championships since 1962, the Bears still won the Atlantic Division regular-season title this past season. He represented the team twice at the AHL All-Star Classic as well.
With that kind of success came plenty of popularity and security with Hershey. He also had indicated his preference to be a head coach several times in the past. On the other hand, his work in Hershey attracted NHL interest. Then came a phone call from Pittsburgh.
“I was really torn about what to do,” Nelson acknowledged. “When Pittsburgh came calling, I just wanted to talk to them. I was very intrigued about what they had to say. I knew some people in management there, but I didn’t know (president of hockey operations and general manager) Kyle Dubas at all. I didn’t know (new head coach) Dan Muse, but every conversation I had, I started getting more intrigued. I like the direction that Kyle has for the Penguins, and I just started weighing things out, and I think it was just time for a new chapter. I talked to a lot of people about it. It was a tough decision, but it’s a great opportunity for me.
“I’m looking forward to it. Obviously I’m going to miss Hershey. I’ll cherish Hershey forever.”
Nelson believes that his time in Hershey put him back in strong contention for NHL work. He had won the Calder Cup with the Grand Rapids Griffins in 2017 and then went to the Dallas Stars as an assistant coach in 2018 for four seasons. But by the end of that tenure in Dallas, the team had gone through a head-coaching change and had even missed the Stanley Cup Playoffs in 2020-21.
“I kind of got in a situation where there’s a lot of movement with the coaching staff, and so my role wasn’t as big. My stock kind of went down,” Nelson said.
“Coming into Hershey and having success put me back on the map. It was a very important part of my career. Grand Rapids, that was great and everything, but some people may say that was a fluke or whatever. But when you win three as a head coach… there’s a reason why the same people win all the time.”
While Hershey itself may be a small town, the Bears have a wide following, including attracting fans from Washington, D.C., the home of the parent Capitals. Nelson came to Hershey fully aware of the team’s importance to the area, and his three seasons only intensified that belief.
“People drive a long way to come watch the Hershey Bears play,” Nelson said. “And the two playoff runs we had when we won the Cup, you just look at the social media posts and people from Australia, Great Britain, everywhere all over the world are following the Hershey Bears… People expect you to win.”
To manage, meet, and exceed those expectations, Nelson relied on his easy-going, low-key, humorous personality to manage his players. On the few occasions that did call for a more confrontational feel, he had built up enough credibility with his players that they would take those stern words seriously. Nelson has admitted that earlier in his coaching career that he struggled to balance those contrasting approaches. Having honed his coaching style through the years, Nelson stressed a team-first, family-like environment above all else. He often pulled away from over-analyzing each win or loss during the regular season, choosing to emphasize a longer-term view that prioritized his team coming together, building strong habits, and preparing themselves for postseason success.
“Nobody likes a yeller and a screamer every time,” Nelson said. “Players just block that out. I try to keep it steady. The biggest thing that I’ll always remember is how we came together as a team. That’ll be the biggest takeaway I’ll have… how much the players love each other, want to play hard for each other.
“That’s where it gets emotional, because you see how much they care.”
With Nelson leaving – along with several players – the 2025-26 version of the Bears will have to find its own way. But the last three years provided plenty of memories for Bears fans to savor.
“I’ve got to say thanks to Washington and Hershey,” Nelson said. “It was a fantastic three years. It really was. We had a lot of success, and it was a lot of fun. I want to say thank you to the fans as well and management and all the staff. Hopefully Hershey continues their success.”
On the American Hockey League beat for two decades, TheAHL.com features writer Patrick Williams also currently covers the league for NHL.com and FloSports and is a regular contributor on SiriusXM NHL Network Radio. He was the recipient of the AHL’s James H. Ellery Memorial Award for his outstanding coverage of the league in 2016.