Shane Doan’s ‘claim to fame?’ Hanging out with Johnny Cash as a kid

Everyone has a story about the time they met a celebrity at a restaurant, snapped a quick photo on the street or maybe ran into them at the grocery store.

For former Arizona Coyotes captain Shane Doan, that moment came when he and his family hosted legendary singer Johnny Cash at their ranch.

“It was fun,” Doan said while guest hosting Doug & Wolf on 98.7 FM Arizona’s Sports Station on Friday. “It was pretty cool.”

Doan said he had no idea Cash and his road crew were on the way when his parents told him he didn’t have to go to school.

“I was only 12 years old growing up on the ranch and I got told I didn’t have to go to school and I was so excited that I didn’t have to go to school,” he said, adding that his parents told him to go saddle the horses instead.

A few minutes later, Doan made a new friend.

“I was saddling horses and my dad introduces me to Johnny Cash.”

“My dad was like, ‘He was the most famous man in the world for all the ‘70s!’ And I was like, ‘Yeah, OK. I know a couple of his songs, Dad.'”

Doan said his family’s Circle Square Ranch was between — well, “hour and a half out of the way but kind of along the way” — Cash’s shows in Edmonton and Calgary. The singer had a three-day break in his schedule, so he traded his guitar for the reigns at the ranch.

“They hung out with us. I took him trail riding,” Doan said. “It was awesome.”

At one point, Cash and his crew put in a 16-hour day moving cattle with Doan.

“They couldn’t walk up their steps to get onto the bus,” he said with a laugh. “A couple of the guys were so sore.”

Cash also made a splash in the nearby town of Stettler, where he popped in to a store to buy long underwear to keep warm while riding.

“This was a while ago, so credit cards weren’t that big in our area, so he put his credit card down and the lady was like, ‘Um, I’m going to need to see some ID with that.’

“She said, ‘Wow, you really look like him.’ He put his ID down and said, ‘Hi, I’m Johnny Cash.'”

The encounter made the local paper.

Of course, Cash couldn’t lose his tour touch, so he played a rehearsal right there on the ranch.

“We’re sitting there, and Johnny Cash is on the stage at Circle Square Ranch, singing and we’re just hanging out,” Doan said. “It was no one else.”

Clearly, Doan went on to have a storied career in the National Hockey League. But those three days at the Circle Square Ranch made for quite the memory.

“It’s my claim to fame,” he said, laughing.

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