Claude Giroux

Lore & Background

Before playing in the NHL, Giroux played his major junior career with the Gatineau Olympiques of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League (QMJHL), where he helped the team win a 2008 President's Cup and earned the Guy Lafleur Trophy as the 2008 playoff MVP. Internationally, he won a gold medal with Team Canada in the 2008 World Junior Ice Hockey Championships. Giroux made his debut with the Flyers in February 2008 and joined the roster full-time midway through the 2008–09 season. In 2011, after the trades of Mike Richards and Jeff Carter, Giroux took over the role of the club's first-line centre. He was the club's top point-scorer for seven seasons. In 2012 and 2014, he finished third in the league in point scoring. In 2018, he finished second in the league with 102 points, behind only Connor McDavid. Giroux was born on January 12, 1988, in Hearst, Ontario, a Francophone town, and is fluent in both English and French. He is the son of Raymond and Nicole Giroux, and has one sister named Isabelle. Giroux's favourite hockey player growing up was Pavel Bure. In mid 2002, at the age of 14, Giroux and his family moved to Ottawa, Ontario, where he attended Béatrice-Desloges High School in the suburban community of Orléans, but graduated in 12th grade at Minto French Catholic Highschool due to the school schedule being flexible around his busy hockey schedule. While living in Orléans, Giroux played Major Bantam AA and Minor Midget AA hockey for the Cumberland Barons, and was the club's leading scorer in the 2002–03 and 2003–04 seasons. After being passed over in the 2004 Ontario Hockey League (OHL) draft, Giroux played for the Cumberland Grads during the 2004–05 season at age 16. Despite missing most of the season after contracting mononucleosis, Giroux scored 40 points in 48 games and was named the Central Junior A Hockey League (CJHL)'s Rookie of the Year. A free agent, Giroux was invited to the (QMJHL)'s Gatineau Olympiques training camp for a walk-on tryout. He was signed shortly after. During his rookie season with the Olympiques, Giroux scored 39 goals for a total of 103 points in 69 games and was named QMJHL Rookie of the Year. He was selected by the Philadelphia Flyers of the NHL in the first round, 22nd overall, of the 2006 NHL entry draft. The Flyers signed Giroux to an entry-level contract on July 23, 2007. Giroux made his NHL debut when the Flyers visited t

In Their Own Story

The Wells Fargo Center is half-empty, the warm-up skaters long gone. The ice is fresh, the boards still glistening. A single skate scrapes a shallow groove into the surface near the left circle — number twenty-six, a familiar scuff. The arena lights hum. Somewhere in the tunnel, a stick taps a puck against the boards, once, twice, three times. The sound carries. It doesn't need to. Everyone in the building already knows the rhythm. The game hasn't started, but the feeling is already there: the feeling of a player who is going to make every single shift matter, whether the scoreboard says it does or not. The lights dim. The crowd inhales. And for a moment, Philadelphia is just a city that believes in one more shift.

Reader's Guide

Claude Giroux is a forward who can play both centre and wing. He is currently an alternate captain for the Ottawa Senators. He previously served as captain of the Philadelphia Flyers, where he played from his debut in February 2008 until his 1,000th game on March 17, 2022. He was drafted 22nd overall in 2006. He is known for his offensive flexibility and was the Flyers' top point-scorer for seven seasons.

Did You Know?

• Giroux was born in Hearst, Ontario, not Saint-Augustin, Quebec.
• He was drafted 22nd overall, not third overall.
• He played his 1,000th game with the Flyers on March 17, 2022, and was traded to the Florida Panthers on March 19, 2022, not to the New York Rangers.
• The Flyers advanced to the 2010 Stanley Cup Finals, not 2013.