HF Habs: Quebec Hockey

[sharknado]

This is the opposite of being true. French players are stigmatized anywhere but in Qc. The problem is not that hockey quebec selects quebecers over english named talents, sorry. Nice try blaming it on them though. I have an english name, it affected my standing in the locker room, but if you have talent you'll make teams.

Yes and that is where I am talking about. Going from experience in my area in Quebec for AAA hockey, first criteria is $$ in the sense who is willing to donate to the team. Eventhough you are paying around $10k to play in Midget AAA, the coaching staff will pick a few kids and sit them game after game and then come to you privately asking if you want to "donate". If yes, your kid starts to play. 2nd criteria is unforunately language. I have seen it year after year after year where if an English Player and French player are equal, preference will go to the kid who speaks the same language as the coach.

I have also seen where one of the coaches of the John Rennie Predators was promoting the french players to the Q scouts. You can go ask any hockey parent from that school and see how pissed they are at that coach becuase of that nonsense.

In a kumbaya world, it should be based on talent and talent alone. Unfortunately, these coaches & organizations don't care about just talent. You may disagree with me all you want but I know what I have seen for years and there are dozens of kids & parents all gone to the states and already have a verbal comittment. Now that's alot of kids that the so called experts and scouts in Qc that they missed.

 

[kalessin]

Easy. Hockey is a rich man game. That’s the root of all those problems.

My friend was easily AA level but he had to stop because of $$$. Dad was a mechanic, mom had a desk job. He 99% wasnt gonna be an nhler but you never know.

Why would this be specific to Quebec?

 

[nhlfan9191]

Yes and that is where I am talking about. Going from experience in my area in Quebec for AAA hockey, first criteria is $$ in the sense who is willing to donate to the team. Eventhough you are paying around $10k to play in Midget AAA, the coaching staff will pick a few kids and sit them game after game and then come to you privately asking if you want to "donate". If yes, your kid starts to play. 2nd criteria is unforunately language. I have seen it year after year after year where if an English Player and French player are equal, preference will go to the kid who speaks the same language as the coach.

I have also seen where one of the coaches of the John Rennie Predators was promoting the french players to the Q scouts. You can go ask any hockey parent from that school and see how pissed they are at that coach becuase of that nonsense.

In a kumbaya world, it should be based on talent and talent alone. Unfortunately, these coaches & organizations don't care about just talent. You may disagree with me all you want but I know what I have seen for years and there are dozens of kids & parents all gone to the states and already have a verbal comittment. Now that's alot of kids that the so called experts and scouts in Qc that they missed.

This isn’t a Quebec thing. This is politics within youth hockey anywhere. It was this way when I played and now that I coach, it’s always going to be a problem. I can’t imagine how bad it would be with an added language conflict.

 

[Emanresu Wen]

Hockey is unfortunately too expensive for low income families and in Quebec we have the lowest salaries in all of Canada.

I have a personal example. My brother was a very prominent hockey player from ages 10 to 14 or so. He went up levels yearly and dominated. His coaches always encouraged him to go even higher. Well I don't exactly remember the cost or the system, because this was 10 years ago, but he was asked to pay something like 1 000 $ to join a higher level league (not including equipment and other costs, ie: travel) and our parents had to decline and there he stopped playing hockey.

 

[Montrealer]

My oldest son (7) played last year in MAHG2 (his first hockey season), which has a noble goal of being a fun environment to learn the game and be releaxed. He initially looked forward to hockey and we definitely wanted to encourage him.

By the end of the season he didn't want to play anymore. The coaches were good guys but it was a one size fits all apporach including some of the MAHG stuff, so if you were good you were fine, but if you were new to team play and struggled like my son he just got more miserable as time goes on.

I get that he was never going to be a pro, but he could have had fun a couple of times a week and enjoyed it. Now he's in figure skating this year (his decision!) and he'll try that out instead. Had a blast during his first lesson last week, more one-on-one.

My kid's not a typical born-with-skates-on, but you never know - some NHLers in the States learned skating at 8 years old and still made it. Here, it feels like if you come in a little late (like mine) you're just ignored until you drop. Thing is, he didn't want to play until last year, so I wasn't going to spend $500 on equipment trying to force my kid into it.

My kids also do swimming and soccer, my other son (5) does skating, he might want to try hockey next year but who knows now.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Yes and that is where I am talking about. Going from experience in my area in Quebec for AAA hockey, first criteria is $$ in the sense who is willing to donate to the team. Eventhough you are paying around $10k to play in Midget AAA, the coaching staff will pick a few kids and sit them game after game and then come to you privately asking if you want to "donate". If yes, your kid starts to play. 2nd criteria is unforunately language. I have seen it year after year after year where if an English Player and French player are equal, preference will go to the kid who speaks the same language as the coach.

I have also seen where one of the coaches of the John Rennie Predators was promoting the french players to the Q scouts. You can go ask any hockey parent from that school and see how pissed they are at that coach becuase of that nonsense.

In a kumbaya world, it should be based on talent and talent alone. Unfortunately, these coaches & organizations don't care about just talent. You may disagree with me all you want but I know what I have seen for years and there are dozens of kids & parents all gone to the states and already have a verbal comittment. Now that's alot of kids that the so called experts and scouts in Qc that they missed.

This is very misleading. The John Rennie coach was promoting players most likely to go the Q route and buffering those most likely to go the prep school/NCAA route - you admit as much. If he doesn't do this the scouts tend to divide a team which ironically you are doing by implying motive to the coach.

Conversely a fair number of non-francophone players made it thru the Quebec, Midget AAA or school hockey,etc. thanks to coaches and parents who understood the options presented to the players. The likes of Jim Montgomery, Mike Ribeiro, thru the recent group Alex Killorn, Corey Crawford, Mike Matheson and others. All had coaches, some parents who understood and guided the players to the best academic or non-academic hockey option.

 

[Canadiens1958]

You would think that scouting would have a negative impact on Quebec hockey players as well. I don't have stats to back it up but I am quite sure that few Quebecers are being scouted out of US college programs or USHL whereas a lot of Ontario kids are in those leagues, being scouted & drafted (Hence ON's higher percentages). (Language would likely be an issue)
PS. glad to see MB & SK more than holding their own!

Biggest issue is that in Quebec high school stops at Grade 11, followed by two or three years of CEGEP so kids cannot go directly to the US college programs - US prep school is required, so college or university scouts, scout them at the at the US prep school level. Basic efficiency. Similar to the USHL, teams have to willing to place such a player in an appropriate academic situation. Not all are able or willing.

 

[sharknado]

The John Rennie coach was promoting players most likely to go the Q route and buffering those most likely to go the prep school/NCAA route - you admit as much.

Not true. Most of the kids that got turned off had intentions for the Q as the first choice but later went the school route because of this nonsense. The ones who did not just stopped playing. And in case you are wondering, the kids that this coach was promoting for all these years always ended up getting drafted in the last 2 rounds by his former team Gatineau.

 

[Habs76]

This really shocks me to be honest. I live in the capital of New Brunswick, so naturally there is a AAA team here- but anyone can play AAA hockey here regardless of where you live without having to drive more than an hour-and-a-half or so in whichever direction- though you would have to go further for road games. I played in a Bantam AA league last year here in which my hometown had two teams, and the rest of the league consisted of one town just 30-45 minutes away, and two nearby rural towns.

Never did I think I could say New Brunswick did something better than Quebec, especially hockey-wise.

 

[QuebecPride]

that should have nothing to do with it. Other teams also pick QC players

Some teams do (Buffalo, San José, Philly, Boston, Tampa, Ottawa, Nashville) but most barely draft in the 'Q. In that aspect, I suggest to anyone interested to learn more about the draft of Quebeckers to read "Le Québec mis en échec" by former Philadelphia Flyers Bob Sirois.

 

[TheBlindFan]

I'm plating twice a week. Hockey is in our blood. If you on't care, we have a problem!

 

[Canadiens1958]

Not true. Most of the kids that got turned off had intentions for the Q as the first choice but later went the school route because of this nonsense. The ones who did not just stopped playing. And in case you are wondering, the kids that this coach was promoting for all these years always ended up getting drafted in the last 2 rounds by his former team Gatineau.

Far from the reputation in the scouting community but hey, you are entitled.

 

[GrizzLeaf]

Are you sure it is just Hockey Canada that is the problem? Usually the release has to come from the team/league that "owns" him, in this case local region in Quebec or Hockey Quebec itself. Once they give it, usually Hockey Canada and Hockey Ontario is OK with it.

What you could try is appealing to both the local Quebec region (whichever one of the 14 it is) and the Federation de Hockey sur Glace du Quebec. It's most likely it's one of them holding it up. Then again, you probably did this already.

Having politics interfering in the handling of an 11 year old's future is just such crap. They need to be more compassionate and flexible in these type of situations.

Hockey Canada gets the blame on this one for me because it's their policy. If the local minor hockey association decides to block a move, Hockey Canada backs them up. If they ok it but the Regional governing body blocks it, Hockey Canada again backs them up. It's even been to court (not us but others) and the ruling is "the rights of association superceede the rights of the individual".

I have names and numbers of associations, regional governing bodies in both provinces, numbers and names at the provincial level (again both provinces) and have even talked to someone at h0ckey canada who was in charge of releases (in Ottawa). At the end of the day, if your association doesn't want to release your son, you have to move, which is a real possibility for us at this point. I had even faked an address in another city to get him released but because we can't prove he goes to school there, no release.

My boy is stuck in house league averaging 4 goals a game plus a bunch of assists and he's not really developing. Coach doesn't coach him because he has a high hockey IQ and skillset behond house league whereas so many of the players on the team need coaching. And practices are boring as hell for him. So, I rent the ice a couple of times a week and put him through his paces, but I'm not a competitive coach (although I have been coaching since '96). At some point he's gonna get bored of it all and move on to some other sport and miss his chance to get a scholarship or even get a shot at the junior level.

Mine is just one story out of many where politics come into play and ruin a potential carreer. Not saying he's NHL material but we'll never know if he never even gets a chance.

 

[123456abcdef]

Hockey Canada gets the blame on this one for me because it's their policy. If the local minor hockey association decides to block a move, Hockey Canada backs them up. If they ok it but the Regional governing body blocks it, Hockey Canada again backs them up. It's even been to court (not us but others) and the ruling is "the rights of association superceede the rights of the individual".

I have names and numbers of associations, regional governing bodies in both provinces, numbers and names at the provincial level (again both provinces) and have even talked to someone at h0ckey canada who was in charge of releases (in Ottawa). At the end of the day, if your association doesn't want to release your son, you have to move, which is a real possibility for us at this point. I had even faked an address in another city to get him released but because we can't prove he goes to school there, no release.

My boy is stuck in house league averaging 4 goals a game plus a bunch of assists and he's not really developing. Coach doesn't coach him because he has a high hockey IQ and skillset behond house league whereas so many of the players on the team need coaching. And practices are boring as hell for him. So, I rent the ice a couple of times a week and put him through his paces, but I'm not a competitive coach (although I have been coaching since '96). At some point he's gonna get bored of it all and move on to some other sport and miss his chance to get a scholarship or even get a shot at the junior level.

Mine is just one story out of many where politics come into play and ruin a potential carreer. Not saying he's NHL material but we'll never know if he never even gets a chance.

We went through a similar situation. The coach wouldn't agree to let my son leave his team, and he had many connections within the association and region. We hired a lawyer to speak with the presidents in the region, and they outright refused a release.

When we eventually threatened to go to the media, the region said that the release would be given. So then there was a new problem. Even with the release, the other association would not accept my son onto the team without a valid address that was zoned for that association. For this, I'm not 100% sure if it was the connections of the previous coach that was causing the problem... or if that's the actual HQ/HC rules. So we had to fake an address. Not only did they ask for proof of address; they also wanted tax papers.

Even with all of that finally completed, my son's file was not being transferred to the new association. The president of the previous association was avoiding phone calls and doing anything in his power to stop my son from leaving. After a week of delays, a quick call to Hockey Quebec had everything fixed up within 2 hours.

All of that to say that politics kill hockey.

As for your situation; when you leave an association before the start of the next season, it's much easier. I'm not sure how it works across the border, but when you do the signup you may only be required to supply an address with hydro bill. I don't see why they would ask for proof of school... unless someone is making a complain that you don't belong to the region...

 

[HuGort]

So NHL.com added some new filters.

I noticed that only 49 QC skaters were in the NHL last season, and only 10 had 30 points or more (this is F and D).

The leading scorer was Droiun and none had 60 + points.

Are we seeing the nail in the coffin for hockey in Quebec? Where are the Quebec superstars the Lafelurs/Lemuiex/Beliveau/Robitailles ?

I remember when the stereotype of a Quebec hockey player was high flying and high scoring, is that over with?

Is hockey to expensive for kids? Is Quebec hockey failing to develop the talent they do have?

Is this an over reaction or are we going to see even fewer QC kids making an impact in the NHL. Keep in mind the less QC stars they are the less kids will be attracted to emulate them and get into hockey which creates a downward cycle of fewer QC hockey players.

Quebec has changed over the generations. Use to be wasn't much else to do in Quebec during the winter months. Not like that anymore. People have other interest

 

[dinodebino]

That is why I admire greatly the mother of the Joly family here, in Gatineau. Listen to this: she had SEVEN boys, and three of them made it to the pros: Raphael, in Germany, Michael, now playing in ECHL (just won the league championship) and d'Artagnan (Calgary prospect). I know the cost in average to bring a kid through the elite minor hockey system. She's a saint!

 

[lo striver]

That is why I admire greatly the mother of the Joly family here, in Gatineau. Listen to this: she had SEVEN boys, and three of them made it to the pros: Raphael, in Germany, Michael, now playing in ECHL (just won the league championship) and d'Artagnan (Calgary prospect). I know the cost in average to bring a kid through the elite minor hockey system. She's a saint!

I dunno man....saints do not name their children "d'Artagnan"

 

[Kriss E]

I'll chime in with my unscientific observations. I can think of two reasons.

1) Quebecers are going into other fields. Short track speed skating and American football are two big draws. And something tells me soccer is another sport that has begun to draw kids away from hockey too.

2) Although Quebec is not drawing proportionally as many immigrants as Ontario, B.C and some of the Western provinces, it still has a big immigrant population. I find it takes that section of the population two or three generations to build an interest and a financial base to commit to the sport. Look at Ontario. They have a much bigger population and a larger percentage of immigrants yet the players coming out of the OHL are mostly 2nd & 3rd generation Canucks. I'm not saying all but most.

I'm sure there are other reasons but those are two that appear to be the most important.

Local success draws interest. When the Expos were here, there was a lot more kids into Baseball. I drove by the parks I used to play and they are pretty much abandoned.

It's the same for Hockey. QC Nordiques left, so there, you lose some interest as the kids in that area born in 96 never saw their Diques play.
Closest team to fall back on, naturally, became the Habs. They've been a mess since that time, so that again doesn't help.

Concussion issues, the cost of the equipment with average income not increasing much also add to the equation.
I think those are the major reasons why.

 

[Habs]

My oldest son (7) played last year in MAHG2 (his first hockey season), which has a noble goal of being a fun environment to learn the game and be releaxed. He initially looked forward to hockey and we definitely wanted to encourage him.

By the end of the season he didn't want to play anymore. The coaches were good guys but it was a one size fits all apporach including some of the MAHG stuff, so if you were good you were fine, but if you were new to team play and struggled like my son he just got more miserable as time goes on.

I get that he was never going to be a pro, but he could have had fun a couple of times a week and enjoyed it. Now he's in figure skating this year (his decision!) and he'll try that out instead. Had a blast during his first lesson last week, more one-on-one.

My kid's not a typical born-with-skates-on, but you never know - some NHLers in the States learned skating at 8 years old and still made it. Here, it feels like if you come in a little late (like mine) you're just ignored until you drop. Thing is, he didn't want to play until last year, so I wasn't going to spend $500 on equipment trying to force my kid into it.

My kids also do swimming and soccer, my other son (5) does skating, he might want to try hockey next year but who knows now.

Ah yes, that one sport where it's ok for parents to yell at 10 year old kids from the stands and insult them and the coaches. It has never changed, hockey parents can be the worst.

 

[Laurentide]

T'was ever thus.

My uncle, who played minor hockey in NDG back in the late 50's, was blocked from playing on the team he wanted to play for that his buddies were on because of politics. He had played a season for Trenholme Park and wanted to switch the following year and couldn't for reasons that sounded like BS to my grandfather. So he did some digging and discovered that these byzantine rules were actually made by the NHL itself. Back then, the NHL had a large measure of control over minor hockey. As soon as any kid enrolled they were essentially the property of the league. That's why teams could sign teenagers to "C" forms which paid them $100/year and bound them to that team for life.

I had a buddy in college who played minor hockey as a teenager in St. Laurent back in the late 70's. He played on three teams simultaneously. He was one of the better players on his team so he was also on the "all star" or "select" team plus he was also loaned out, as a "ringer", to play on a team in a lower division under another name. It was all politics, kick-backs and corruption.

In the last 10-15 years I've been to see a couple of minor hockey games to watch my friends' kids play, one in Quebec and another in Ontario. Neither experience was good. In Quebec, the 10 year old kid of a co-worker was playing in a little arena just north of Montreal. The kids were all around 10 and the referee was probably 16. The abuse that these hockey parents heaped on that referee would sicken most people. Too many hockey dads taking out their own frustrations. In Ontario, my friend was the coach of his teenage daughter's team. The opposing team had two players who were the daughters of their coach, who made a complete idiot of himself in front of them. At every opportunity, he would berate the referee from the bench (the ref was a teenaged kid) and it got so bad that he was ejected from the game - something I never thought I'd see in a rec league game. My buddy told me that this was nothing compared to the fist fights he had witnessed in the parking lot on numerous occasions.

Even when I was playing novice hockey as a 7 and 8 year old in the early 70's I had a teammate or two who's dads would chew them out in the dressing room after games if they didn't score a goal. Often players would take the puck off the sticks of their own teammates during games because they needed to score to avoid the wrath of their fathers.

Organized youth sports do more to drive youth away from sports and toward playing video games in a room by themselves than anything I've ever seen. The most fun I ever had as a kid wasn't getting up at 5am on a Saturday to go to a 6am practice in a drafty old arena. It was the hours spent playing street hockey until it was too dark to see or the pick-up games played at a local outdoor rink without a grown-up in sight.

 

[JianYang]

Aside from the seeming corruption, alot of these excuses can be applied to BC. Heck, there's less of a hockey culture here given that a large chunk of the population doesn't even get "hockey weather" for the most part.

My perception is that bc is still doing okay relative to Quebec, but it would be interesting to see some numbers.

 

[Not The One]

In the last 10-15 years I've been to see a couple of minor hockey games to watch my friends' kids play, one in Quebec and another in Ontario. Neither experience was good. In Quebec, the 10 year old kid of a co-worker was playing in a little arena just north of Montreal. The kids were all around 10 and the referee was probably 16. The abuse that these hockey parents heaped on that referee would sicken most people. Too many hockey dads taking out their own frustrations. In Ontario, my friend was the coach of his teenage daughter's team. The opposing team had two players who were the daughters of their coach, who made a complete idiot of himself in front of them. At every opportunity, he would berate the referee from the bench (the ref was a teenaged kid) and it got so bad that he was ejected from the game - something I never thought I'd see in a rec league game. My buddy told me that this was nothing compared to the fist fights he had witnessed in the parking lot on numerous occasions.

Not surprised at all. Seems like exactly the type who came on this board for the express purpose of virtually heckling Desharnais in game-threads. Yuck.

Anyway, there are probably a galaxy of reasons why this is happening.

Health: Now we know what a concussion does to a kid's brain, but whenver the issue is brought up in the media there are a bunch of fans bashing Quebec for being sissies and blaming no-contact policies for the death of QC hockey.

Lifestyle: I already get up at 6am every weekday to work and provide for my kids and don't get to see them enough. I'll be dead before I do that on the weekend to sit in a cold arena for half the day. My kids will try soccer, baseball, gymnastics, skating but probably not hockey unless they really really want it.

Money: I thought new aluminum hockey sticks were expensive 20 years ago. Now it's just crazy. Add skates, fees, travel, etc... Parent's have bills to pay.

Passion: The Nordiques and the rivalry is gone, and now money and self-interest rules the game. The Habs are now just another team with francophone management (for now) but with barely any francophone players. They haven't drafted any high-profile francos in years and get crapped on the few times they actually do. I used to get my kids hyped up for Habs games, and get them to learn some of the players's names but even I lost interest in this team and this fanbase often disgusts me so I stopped caring, mostly.

Opportunities: The Q isn't really the Q anymore. Only about 2/3 of the teams are in Québec and AFAIK more than 40% of it's players are born outside the province as well. It continues to be under-scouted as well.

I could go on about the NHL being an anglo-boys' club but I think even without that the previous points explain most of it.

Edit: This may be controversial, but I'll add this to the "opportunities" section. The Q used to be the showcase for players from Québec, but now it's diluted. And there are or were yearly arguments that francophone Q players were also underrepresented on team Canada, which should be the other main showcase for them.

Canada would never let it happen, but Québec needs Team QC at the juniors. This would give the province something to aim and to root for, and an opportunity for kids to make a name for themselves. Even the team doing badly would be a net positive to force change on Hockey Québec, just like they did for Québec athletes competing at the Olympics. Switzerland, Latvia, Denmark, Belarus, Kazhakhstan players get this, we don't.

 

[Laurentide]

Money is the bottom line usually. As I have written elsewhere, the cost of putting your kid into the sport and the decade-long financial and time commitment you have to make in order for a kid with any promise whatsoever to have a chance of making it to the show is astronomical. The best hockey prep schools which combine rigorous academics along with elite coaching cost a fortune and are exclusively English speaking. There is no francophone equivalent in Quebec so you have to choose to either be a full-time student or an uneducated hockey player like Bergevin, Lefebvre and Daigneault. Canadian university hockey is mostly a dead end. You can count the number of CIS graduates who made it to the NHL on the fingers of one hand pretty much.

Immigrant parents almost never allow their kids to choose sports over education and certainly not a sport which is unfamiliar to them and so violent and dangerous to boot. But most parents, especially if they have more than one child, simply cannot afford the cost of the sport. And since kids get into the sport at such a young age, many of them experience burn-out by the time they hit their mid-teens. I only played 5 years of organized minor hockey starting at around age 7 or 8 and once I hit that wall I was done and never missed it afterward. To me, hockey was something you watched on Saturday night, not something you got out of bed for at 5am on Saturday morning.

 

[Grate n Colorful Oz]

Money ruins everything

 

[cphabs]

Yeah, but Molson has french canadian GMs and coaches. He's doing enough for the hockey population of Quebec.

Nothing to see here! The Montreal Canadiens is doing the MAXIMUM it can do for hockey in Quebec.

Winning a Stanley Cup? In any case, Ice hockey is a 3 tool sport that players need to master... at 20-30 mph. You need to manufacture ice as well. It is a marvel of Western Civilization IMO.