CANTLON: LACROIX LOVED THE JOURNEY 

BY: Gerry Cantlon, Howlings

HARTFORD, CT – The annual Hartford Whalers Day at Dunkin Donuts Park, home to the Hartford Yard Goats, was a special day filled with plenty of reminiscing about days gone by with some of the team’s legends.

André Lacroix holds a special place in his heart for Hartford. He was beloved for his play on the ice and his work on the WTIC-AM radio with Chuck Kaiton. He recently published his memoir, “After the Second Snowfall,” a well-crafted paean to his family. Lacroix was the youngest of 14 children and grew up near Quebec City.

Like the famous French-Canadians artists Marc-Aurèle Fortin and Alfred Pellan, the crafty playing Lacroix weaves a beautiful picture of his ascension to the upper echelons of hockey from small-town in Quebec.

THE BOOK TITLE

A seemingly innocuous title, Lacroix couldn’t wait to speak about it.

“Nobody has asked me about it,” Lacroix, now 76-years-old, said in his beautifully French-accented English. “I didn’t want to write a book just about stats. I really wanted to tell people about my life behind the numbers.

“When I was writing this book, a lot of my friends suggested, “The Magician,” which was my nickname when I played, but everybody knows that. It was a big thing for us kids in Quebec. When you had the first snowfall, you knew what was coming next. Our real hockey season was gonna start.

“Usually, after the second snowfall, it would be cold enough for the ponds in the area to begin to freeze in my hometown of Lauzon. I never played in an indoor rink until I was 13.”In 1989 Lauzon became known as Lévis after the two cities merged and later amalgamated with ten other cities in 2002. Lauzon was northwest of Lévis but located along the south shore near the mighty St. Lawrence River and is located east of Quebec City, separated by the Quebec and Pierre-Laporte bridges that connect western Lévis. The ferry was a common way to travel to the historically beautiful and architecturally rich Quebec City.

Hélène

Coming from a huge family, Lacroix was in a team environment from the beginning. His sister Hélène was an amazing part of his early journey in Quebec.

“My sister Hélène was born in 1940. She followed me playing hockey from the start. She was wonderful. She had a job in Quebec City with an insurance company, and she found out that I was going to play junior in Quebec City, so she knew I had to take the ferry from Lévis to Quebec City, and I had to pay a fee to get on the ferry.

“She bought me a booklet of tickets, so my parents would not have to pay for my travel to practices and games. I really don’t know what would have happened if Hélène did not do this for me. She followed my whole career, and I owe her a lot.”

JACQUES

Another important sibling was his brother Jacques, number 13 in the family tree. He became a priest and was a great older brother figure along with his parents. His mother’s name is Albéa, and his father is Alfred, whom he patterned some of his life after.

“My brother Jacques was born in 1944. Jacques was always the quiet one in the family. He played a little bit of hockey when he was about ten years old, but he did not like it as I did.

“It was such a good feeling when he decided to be a priest. It made my mother so happy. Having such a big family and having a priest was very special. Jacques did, and still does, a lot of good work in every parish he was assigned to.

“He also volunteers every year to go to Haiti to help the people in need. My parents were the biggest influence on how to conduct myself on and off the ice. I never wanted to do anything that would hurt their feelings. I believe that both Jacques and I felt the same way about our parents. We were brought up Catholic, and I attended Mass as often as I could. Sometimes it wasn’t easy because of my schedule. Our church in Lauzon was St. Joseph church.”

JUNIOR HOCKEY MEMORIES

Lacroix played junior hockey with the Montreal Junior Canadiens and the OHA (now OHL) with the Peterborough Petes, where his skills grew and got him noticed by scouts. He led the league with 80 assists, for the second straight year, and 120 points. He won the Red Tilson Trophy.

In 1966, Lacroix played an exhibition game against the Soviet Union that was considered the first big game between the two hockey powers.

Canada held a 3-1 lead after two periods. Lacroix assisted on a goal by his junior teammate, Danny Grant, and scored one as well. The team would go on to lose the game, 4-3. That team also featured Bobby Orr, who was with the Oshawa Generals (OHL) lent to them a year before going to the NHL.

“To be honest with you, I don’t remember much about that game. I knew I was playing with the best junior players in the world, and it was very special.”

NUMBERS

Lacroix wore number seven for most of his career. But, unfortunately, there isn’t much of a back story as to when the Whalers were admitted to the NHL from the WHA in 1979, and Lacroix had to switch his jersey number.

“My first choice when I started playing was number 16 because of the great Henri Richard of the Canadiens. We were about the same size, and I always enjoyed watching him play hockey. That number was taken, so I chose number 7 because I thought it was a lucky number.

“I went to number 4 in Hartford because (defenseman) Gordie Roberts had number 7, and we asked him if he would like to change his number 7 to number 4, and he did not want to do it.”

WHA BRINGS CHANGES

The WHA opened the door for hockey players in the minors, juniors, and especially college players who had been passed over until the late Jack Kelly began drafting and signing them with the New England Whalers.

The WHA revolutionized hockey. Some of their innovations succeeded like playing Europeans and Americans, playing the Soviets and Europeans regularly, challenging the draft system, and changing the system completely. But, unfortunately, some of their moves didn’t work, for example, the blue puck, getting a team in Florida, and their failure to land a consistent national TV contract.

“The WHA did so much for hockey. It increased the salary for the players. It opened the door for a lot of players who were playing hockey in the minors. It also opened the door for coaches and general managers.

“The NHL had a monopoly, and they lost all of that,” Lacroix said. “When the WHA started, the NHL never believed the league would survive, and we sure proved them wrong.”

GETTING INTO PRO HOCKEY

Lacroix’s players’ rights were claimed in the WHA General Draft on February 12, 1972, by his hometown, the Quebec Nordiques. On paper, it looked like a home run for the new league, starting with Lacroix in his hometown Quebec City starting a new league, but ultimately it didn’t work out when he didn’t sign with the team.

“The reason I did not sign with the Nordiques was that we could not come to an agreement on the terms of a contract. We tried, but they wanted me to take a discount to play in my hometown, and I would not do it as much as I wanted to play there.”

Lacroix’s rights were traded for cash to the Miami Screaming Eagles franchise, which never got off the ground. Instead, the franchise relocated to Pennsylvania and became the Philadelphia Blazers, where Lacroix began his WHA odyssey.

NO CHAMPIONSHIP, BUT CLOSE

Despite a productive and well-traveled career, Lacroix never captured a championship title.

“I wished I could have won the Avco Cup or the Stanley Cup, but I am very happy with the success I had on all the teams I played for on and off the ice.”

The closest he came to winning a title was with the 1967 AHL’s Quebec Aces. They were the top team in the AHL when he received a late-season recall to the Philadelphia Flyers.

“I believe we would have a great chance to win the (Calder) Cup with the Quebec Aces if I would have stayed there.  I would have won the scoring title since I was up by about 25 points in scoring when I was called up. I also had a chance to beat a record of six hat tricks in one season in the AHL. I had six hat tricks when I decided to join the Flyers.”

The Quebec team featured future NHL and WHA players Simon Nolet and Rosaire Paiement. In the finals, they lost to the Rochester Americans in six games.

BACK TO THE WHA

Lacroix was up against some highly-skilled players in the WHA. Real Cloutier, Marc Tardif with the Nordiques, Robbie Ftorek with the Phoenix Roadrunners and Cincinnati Stingers, the late Tom Webster of the Whalers, and the course the Howes, Gordie, Mark, and Marty, all of the Houston Aeros and the Whalers.

The upstart league came at a price professionally for those who played there as far as the NHL was concerned.

“That list of players would have been great players in the NHL too. There were not that many teams in the NHL when I started, and I think the league was ready to punish any player that joined the WHA. I played against some very good centers in the WHA. Every team had some strong centers, and we always played against each other. The coaches wanted to play their best against the (other teams’) best. “

TOUGHEST PLAYERS LACROIX PLAYED AGAINST IN THE WHA

“Gerry Cheevers (Cleveland Crusaders) was the toughest goalie I played against in the WHA.”

Wayne Gretzky was with the Indianapolis Racers during his time in the WHA, and to Lacroix, it was obvious that The Great One was unique.

“You could tell Gretzky had the skills, but he was so young at the time (just 17). Who knew?”

After seven years and 25 cities, the WHA ended. Lacroix stood atop the mountain with 547 assists and 798 total points and was fourth in goals with 251 in 551 games. He led the league in scoring twice. The first was in 1972-73 and the second in 1974-75.

Tardif, a fellow Quebecer, was second with 666 points. His 106 assists in the 1974-75 season were a pro hockey record for seven years until Gretzky broke it with 120 in 1981-82.

TOUGH GUYS GALORE

The league, among its other qualities, when fighting was more of a part of the game, had a collection of ruffians that also made the crossover to the NHL after the two leagues merged.

“There were a lot of tough players in the league,” Lacroix stated. “Every team had at least one player who knew what his role was, but they never tried to come after me. (The late) Dave Semenko in Edmonton, Kim Clackson in Winnipeg, Nick Fotiu in Hartford, Jack Carlson in Minnesota, and Paul Stewart in Cincinnati. They would go after the tough player on the other team and left me alone.”

SLAPSHOT, NOT A FAN

Don’t count Lacroix as a fan of the movie Slap Shot.  It’s based on the true and wild antics of the old North American Hockey League. There’s also a touch of the Eastern Hockey League, and a dash of the WHA.

“I did not watch Slap Shot when it came out because I thought it was a disgrace. It showed hockey in a very bad light. I did not want the people to think this is what hockey looks like.”

HARTFORD DIDN’T GO AS EXPECTED

His last season of playing pro hockey was playing in Hartford. It still doesn’t sit well with him.

“I did not think the Whalers handled my situation very well in my last year. I believe I had probably a couple more good years, but their mind was made up before training camp. I did not have an agent, and I think I would have been coaching after I retired if I had an agent. In those days, agents represented players as well as coaches and general managers.”

Lacroix’s association with the Whalers ended resulting from his unbridled honesty about how the Whalers were playing.  The games were heard on WTIC-AM 1080, whose signal boomed all the way to Quebec and Ontario at night and as far south as Virginia and west of Hartford all the way to Indiana.

The players and their families heard the often loquacious Lacroix, and some weren’t happy, and neither was management. Lacroix stood his ground and wanted proof from the team, but it never came, but his eight-year association with the voice of the Whalers Chuck Kaiton came to a very sudden and swift end.

POST HOCKEY

His post-hockey career has brought him some amazing moments.

A major highlight for Lacroix came when his hometown named a hockey rink after him. It is now known as André Lacroix Arena, located on Boulevard Guillaume-Couture in Lévis.

“I was so happy when I received word that they were going to name an arena after me in my hometown. It was amazing and a complete surprise. I was very happy to grow up in a small town, and it makes it so special when people reward you with your name on a building.”

Lacroix still visits Quebec City.

“I still go see some of my old friends when I get a chance to go back, and I always stop by the arena that has my name on it. I can’t go now, obviously, but I will go when the borders open up. I will also be going in 2022 because Quebec City (and Las Vegas) will host a 50th anniversary of the WHA (Nordiques team being born).”

CHARITABLE WORK

Lacroix started a foundation to assist people with disabilities while he was in Connecticut. It’s work he cherishes and treats those accomplishments as he does the ones he did on the ice.

“My Foundation does not exist anymore. It stopped when I left Hartford to go to Oakland, California. The May Company helped me a lot in Hartford, and I could not find a strong enough company to help me in Oakland. I am very proud of all the work we did with my Foundation.”

Lacroix now resides in Chagrin Falls, OH, where his son Andre, Jr. lives. His daughter, Chantal, resides in North Carolina. Both of his children played their youth hockey at a Kingswood-Oxford, prep school in West Hartford.

Lacroix dabbled in coaching at the Division-III level at Trinity College and until three years ago was coaching at The University School, a private prep school in Ohio. He never caught on coaching juniors or in the AHL because of his strong, independent streak.

“The thing that hurt me the most was the fact I did not have an agent, and I also believe that people did not want to hire somebody who might know as much or more than them. I tried very hard to get into coaching, and the answer that I kept getting was that they were set with their coaching staff. I knew deep down I could have helped a team with all the knowledge I had about the game.”

Lacroix still managed to impart a lot of knowledge and hockey wisdom to a broad array of players from all over the world.

PERSONAL LIFE

Lacroix is now a grandfather of seven, some of which are playing hockey.

“Things are great in Chagrin Falls right now. My son Andre, Jr. has three boys, and they are all playing hockey for their school in Andre III, Anthony, and Alex.

“Chantal lives in North Carolina and has four children, one boy and three girls.

“My other grandson, Luke, plays hockey as do my granddaughters Beatrice {fraternal twin with Luke) and Adie 11 plays hockey.”

Andre III wears the number 7 skating for Gilmour Academy in Ohio.

Lacroix’s hockey journey has been both a work of art and a labor of passion. His contribution to the Hartford hockey community cannot be diminished…even all these years later.

HARTFORD WHALERS

HOME