It's hard to pick just one story about Shane Doan that stands above others.

With Doan’s jersey retirement ceremony taking place before Sunday’s home game against the Winnipeg Jets, some of those closest to the former Coyotes captain offered stories, testimonials and opinions of what Doan meant to the organization and professional sports in Arizona.

In this story, you will hear from the following voices:

Rich Nairn, Coyotes executive vice president of communications and broadcasting. With a brief interruption, Nairn has worked with the Coyotes/Jets organization since 1993.

Stan Wilson, Coyotes head equipment manager. Wilson has worked with the Coyotes/Jets organization since 1990.

John Chayka, Coyotes president of hockey operations and general manager. Chayka has worked with the Coyotes since 2015.

Paul Bissonnette, Coyotes forward from 2009-14 and current radio analyst and brand ambassador.

Keith Tkachuk, Coyotes/Jets forward from 1991-2001.

Jeremy Roenick, Coyotes forward from 1996-2001.

The original Winnipeg Jets, who moved to Arizona in 1996, drafted Doan in 1995. Nairn said the first time he heard the name was researching that NHL draft. The first time he met him was in Detroit during the Stanley Cup Final, where the league brings in top prospects.

Nairn: "I guess the first time I really heard his name was I was looking at a few players on (NHL) Central Scouting's list or Hockey News' list heading into that '95 draft of players that might be available in the top 10. The Jets at the time were picking seventh and I was with the organization and I was always trying to do my homework. And it was before a lot of stuff was available on the Internet."

Wilson: "Yeah, it's right at the draft, because you don't really know. I mean, we're not in on the inside, to know who's getting picked or whatever."

Nairn: "You know, I just, I saw his name and read about him. Big power forward, scoring winger … I didn't know anything about him and I was fortunate to work for the NHL at the Stanley Cup Finals between Detroit and New Jersey and at the finals — as they do to this day — they usually bring in the top 10 prospects, I think now they bring in the top five or whatever. Every year it changes but Shane Doan was one of those players. So, we went to a Detroit Tigers baseball game and I got to hang with him the whole day and I was just blown away by the type of person he was and his personality, and how warm and outgoing and how friendly he was. I couldn't believe it."

Nairn: "As most people think, like the first time you meet him, you don't think it's real. You think it's sort of an act, and you know, I got to talk to him that day and the next day and over a two-day period. I really got to know him and I wouldn't say I bonded with him but I was drawn towards him. He was such a great guy and so friendly and he remembered your name when he talked to you. And he'd pull you aside and ask you about you and your family and your job and it was just like, "Who is this guy?" which is bizarre. Like, no one does this. Anyway, so I got back to Winnipeg and talk to a few people in the office and conveyed my stories about him and how blown away I was by the type of person he was. Obviously he could play, he's gonna be a top-10 player.

"And I told our GM, John Paddock, that I was just so impressed with him and he was like, 'That's interesting, 'cause that's the guy we want,' and I'm like, 'Really?' And he's like, 'Yeah, that's the guy we want, but we're not sure he'll be there.' So anyway, fast forward a few weeks later, we're at the NHL draft in Edmonton and Shane's from Halkirk, Alberta, which is close to Edmonton and everyone in the building thought the Oilers would take him with the sixth overall pick. They picked one spot before us and the whole place ... as the Oilers and Glen Sather went to the podium to make their pick, the whole building was chanting 'Doan, Doan, Doan.'"

Wilson: "You would have thought that he was going to get drafted by Edmonton. I mean, they were chanting his name."

Nairn: "I'm like, 'Oh man, we're not gonna get him. There's no chance,' and sure enough, they went to the podium and picked Steve Kelly from the Prince Albert Raiders, who ended up being a decent player who played like a couple hundred games in the NHL, but nothing like Shane."

Tkachuk: "Yeah, I mean that was probably out of our element a little bit because there's not a lot of coverage, I mean there's coverage, but it's not like it is now with the media, with Twitter, and all the social media that you know everything about every player, but being a kid from Edmonton, you have the whole surprise that they wouldn't take a guy like that, but it worked out great for us."

Nairn: "I looked down the table and there's John Paddock and he shot up out of his chair and I knew right then we were taking Shane Doan and I was like so relieved but also excited to be able to work with him. And then I was very fortunate to work with him for 21 years after that, so it was pretty incredible."

Doan immediately made an impact with his genuine personality carried in a 6-foot-1, 220-pound frame that was made for hockey.

Tkachuk: "When we got him, he was obviously wet behind the ears a little bit, a good western Canadian kid. Really just a quiet, very, very nice young man who just came in and almost a little bit like a goofy kid taking it all in, eyes wide open, like he couldn't believe he was in the NHL playing. I mean now you look at him, how many games later, 1,500-plus games later, and he still has that really, really nice, quiet personality and it never changed."

Wilson: "He's like any other kid really, when you first get them, other than you notice he's a mountain of a man already ... at 18. So that was the big thing, just a genuine, good person. That's the funny thing; nothing's really changed. He's the same guy he was when he came in, just a little older, really."

Although Doan notched six assists in his first 16 games in the NHL, it wasn't until Nov. 14, 1995, when Doan got his first NHL goal in regulation against the Chicago Blackhawks. His second wound up being the overtime winner.

Wilson: "I have memories of it. I mean, it's not a front-page (memory), and I have the worst memory, so that's really the bad part ... I live in the present, I guess, or I'm already on my way to losing it, but yeah."

Nairn: "It was nice to do it at home and the fans were obviously behind him and were hoping he would score at home. We weren't as focused on it as other people were, but yeah, I mean it was a great goal. Just showed his ability to score which he did throughout his career. His poise, right time, right place, his hockey sense."

Tkachuk: "That was a long time ago … I can't remember exactly. But I'm sure he celebrated pretty good for it — and well-deserved, too."

Nairn: "Everything, it was pretty cool. I remember sitting in the building and just really being excited for him and then afterwards of course he did as much media as possible as usual and couldn't wipe the smile off his face. But yeah, it was just a nice moment."

Doan’s time in Winnipeg was short-lived. The franchise was relocated to Phoenix in 1996 and was rechristened the Coyotes. It was an abrupt move, from the middle of Canada to the American West. No one adapted better than Doan.

Tkachuk: "He was a huge ambassador, yeah. Not just for hockey but for sports in general, just the way he carries himself, the way he gets interviewed, the way he reaches out and (is) able to affect somebody in a positive way, I think he's a huge role model for anybody in Arizona, for the amount of years he's been there through ups and downs and (is) always willing to lend a hand to help grow the game or help do this for some sort of charity, so that makes a pretty special person and there is not a lot of media coverage hockey-wise in Arizona, so he kind of gets lost throughout the league, but within all the players around the league, he has a lot of respect, that's for sure."

Roenick: "No question. He was a guy that was being the first to volunteer to do anything in town. That's what I'm telling you. He's such a religious and loving guy, and he had those leadership qualities. He was the type of guy that you meet him right away, you know he's going to be a leader of something. You know he's going to be a captain. Right? And I said the same thing about Joe Pavelski in San Jose, him being the captain. Doaner became a captain, so there's a lot of different characteristics that he has that enabled him to become the staple of Phoenix."

Nairn: "Shane learned a lot from Tkachuk and Roenick, who were tremendous ambassadors for the Coyotes and did a lot to grow the game, so did Rick Tocchet. So I think he was fortunate ... He would've done that regardless but he was really fortunate for the first two, three years to learn from them and then he emerged as a true leader in our dressing room."

Nairn: "I think all of us, coming to Arizona, we fell in love with it right away — with the weather and how passionate and crazy the fans were. But I think Shane being like a cowboy and a ranch guy, coming to Arizona was just the perfect fit for him. It was just like, the perfect place for Shane Doan to play. He basically was going from one home to a new home and that's why I think he fell in love with it and stayed so long. And of course, the type of person and player he was, he was never even considered to be traded, but I think his longevity is basically due to the fact he was a great player but also he fell in love with this place. It was his second home. It became his new home."

Doan had one of the most wild rides of his career during the 2011-12 season (his 16th in the league) when he tallied his first hat trick on Jan. 7, 2012, and later that year led the Coyotes to a Western Conference Finals berth.

Bissonnette: "I remember how weird (the hat trick) was and how weird ... I think he got the two goals fairly early in the hockey game."

Nairn: "I just remember that everyone was so relieved for him, because, a hat trick's nice but it doesn't really mean anything. I mean, there's so many players that are great goals scorers who, it took a while to get a hat trick but with Shane, it's just bad luck that it took that long, because he was a really good goal scorer."

Bissonnette: "And the time was winding down, we're like, "Ah man, he's gonna have 68 or 69 two-goal games without a hat trick." And he came over the blue line, and I don’t know how that puck went in. It was along the ice, it was a s--t goal and the whole building went absolutely bananas."

Nairn: "It was just typical Shane. It was drawn out, goal reviewed, one second left on the clock. Is it really gonna count? It couldn't have been easy, right? Nothing really came easy to him, but it's typical Shane. He worked really hard to accomplish everything he did in life and his career and he worked hard for that hat trick late in the game and busted his butt to get down there and score it and it paid off in the end. But yeah, it was fun after the game to see all of those hats around him in the dressing room."

Bissonnette: "It was great; it was a special moment. It was a great three-, four-year period there with the Coyotes where things were going so well and the fan base was growing and it was ... awesome to be a part of."

Nairn: "He was consistently a 20-goal scorer every year in the league so why couldn't he have scored three goals in a game previous? I have no idea. It’s just gotta be bad luck, so when he finally got it, it was just relief because you could just check it off the box. He'd done everything else, it was nice.

"I think people in the building collect the hats and we usually donate them to charity or give them away. Obviously we wanted to ... It was so special for Shane that we really didn't ask for them, they just brought them down to the dressing room. And one of the trainers, I don't remember who, brought them in and they just kind of dumped them all on the floor in front of him and it was just the perfect photo and then of course we had all three pucks — the real pucks — and did a plaque for him after the fact, with that picture and I know he still has it in his TV room upstairs in his house. So it's a special memento for him. It's pretty cool."

Just a few months later, the Coyotes made the deepest playoff run in franchise history, led by Doan, of course.

Bissonnette: "I always tell the story ... I usually back it up a couple years, and our first year, my first year with the team, we ended up making the playoffs, and we made the playoffs three years in a row, and there was a stretch of about 15 games where Doaner, maybe it was 15 or 20, he hadn't scored a goal. But the team was having success and that's all he cared about. He wasn't worried about his ice time. He wasn't worried the fact that he wasn't getting put in those opportunities. He was happy that the guys in those opportunities were getting the job done."

At 5 p.m. on Sunday, Doan will see his jersey hoisted to a place of honor at Gila River Arena, and will share the moment not only with the fans who adored him, but his friends and peers both in and out of the hockey world.

Nairn: "It means I'm old, but the story I often think about (is) the story I told about being there when he was drafted. And now I'm there still to retire his jersey and to hoist it to the rafters; that's pretty remarkable. Not for me, but for both of us because we're friends and I want to do it right for him. It's been really stressful because I want to make sure it's done right and first-class, because that's what he deserves."

Wilson: "Like any player, I think he wanted to play forever, and you can't. So I think you go through that adjustment, or whatever. So this, I think is going to be a finality for a lot of us, and so it'll be an interesting night, to see how people react. I think some people may react differently than they thought they might."

Nairn: "There's so many details and I want to get everything right, and you know I just want to make this a special night for him because it only happens once, and for this organization, it's the only time we've ever done it. I'm anticipating eight to 10 or 12 years from now, (Oliver) Ekman-Larsson will be the next guy to be retired, right? Because it's longevity and it's based on numbers and career and stats and all that and tremendous people."

Chayka: "I expect his legend to continue to live on for a long, long time, as it should, based off the impact he had and how he impacted people's lives on the ice and off the ice. With teammates and with fans, and with the entire staff, so yeah, he's a special person, did a lot of great things, so he certainly gets the recognition he deserves."

Wilson: "It'll be interesting, because like I said, we go back a long ways, and I know all the ... I’ve had a lot of the feelings that he's ... A lot of my feelings come through him, of what's going on. He's so dedicated to the team and the city and wanting to keep the team here and do all these things. So, it will be an interesting night."

Tkachuk: "I'll guarantee you, he's affected a lot of kids who are not kids anymore in a huge way whether it's Auston Matthews playing hockey growing up there or just a baseball player he met or anything. Just the positive influence he had on all kids. Who doesn't want their kid to grow up just like Shane Doan? He's just a tremendous person."

Nairn: "It is a special time for me personally, because I care so much about the man and I wanna make sure it's done right for him and his family. And I'm sure it will be very emotional for him, but it will be very emotional for me and for Stan and for the other trainers. And for all of us who've been there so long with him and care so much about him. So, it hasn't hit home yet, I'm sure when that banner goes up, there won't be a dry eye in the place."

Wilson: "Hopefully everybody holds it together and it'll be good because it'll be emotional for sure."

PHOTOS: Arizona Coyotes 2018-19 season