Claude Vilgrain

Did You Know?

• Vilgrain's daughter Cassandra played collegiate ice hockey and later joined Brynäs IF of the Swedish Women's Hockey League.
• He is currently head coach of the U18 Prep Notre Dame Hounds at Athol Murray College of Notre Dame.

Early life

Claude Vilgrain was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on March 1, 1963. His family valued education: his great-uncle was a doctor, his grandfather a judge, and his father an economist. When Vilgrain was about a year old, his father Alix moved the family to Quebec City for an economist job, having studied there for seven years. Vilgrain later said his parents’ openness to Canadian culture allowed him to play hockey. Raised in a small Quebec City suburb, he first encountered racism while playing junior hockey in Montreal.

Career

Claude Vilgrain spent three seasons with the Laval Voisins of the QMJHL, beginning in 1980. For two of those years, he played alongside Mario Lemieux, finishing second on the team in scoring with 126 points. Vilgrain later said he tried to copy Lemieux’s moves and looked back fondly on their time together, though he was shaken by the racial slurs he heard during games. The Detroit Red Wings picked him in the sixth round of the 1982 NHL draft. In his final junior season, he notched 46 goals and 80 points, earning a spot on the QMJHL Second All-Star Team. But after Detroit did not invite him to their 1983 training camp, and he refused to play another season with the Voisins, the Red Wings never signed him.