[5][6][7] One of the six McShane brothers who played in the VFA or VFL (or both) for Geelong, McShane started his career at Geelong in the Victorian Football Association (VFA) in 1887, and played 210 games for the club (135 in the VFA and 75 in the VFL), becoming the first Geelong player to play 200 games for the club before moving to Carlton in 1902.

In 1899, he was the first player to kick 10 or more goals in a VFL/AFL game, scoring 11 against St Kilda, whose one-point total in the same match become the still-standing record for the lowest-score by a team in VFL/AFL history.

McShane retired following the 1904 Grand Final against Fitzroy:[10] at the time, his career total of 258 games was second in elite Victorian football behind his longtime Geelong teammate Peter Burns (305 games, 216 in the VFA and 89 in the VFL), and third in elite Australian rules football behind Burns and the South Australian Jack "Dinny" Reedman (281 games, would retire at the end of 1909 with 319 games).

He died at the Caritas Christi Hospice, in Kew, Victoria on 26 July 1950.

[11][12] This Australian rules football biography of a person born in the 1860s is a stub.