It seems somehow so perfect one of the Habs’ heroes of the week is a dude from France.
Montreal is home to about 200,000 people from France, making it the largest population of French nationals outside of their homeland, and the growing French presence in the city is one of the bigger demographic changes here over the past few decades. Walking in the Plateau-Mont-Royal borough, particularly the cool neighbourhood around Laurier Park, you sometimes feel like you’re in one of Paris’ hipper arrondissements.
So it’s totally cool to see Alexandre Texier, that rarest of creatures, a player from France in the National Hockey League, had a magic soirée Wednesday at the Bell Centre. He had a goal and two assists, the first three-point game of his NHL career, and he was named first star of the game, which the Canadiens won handily 4-1 against the Calgary Flames. His goal was an absolute beauty, showing he’s got quite a shot.
After the game in the dressing room, Canadiens players also gave him the wolf headdress they always get their player of the game to don.
When he skated to centre ice to be interviewed by RDS’s Marc Denis after being named first star, the crowd at the Bell Centre went nuts.
Oh, and he’s also been named to France’s Olympic hockey team.
Texier only joined the Canadiens in late November. He was put on waivers by the St. Louis Blues and after no other team picked him up during the 24-hour waiver window, Montreal signed the winger to a one-year, $1-million contract, which is chump change by today’s NHL standards.
To say hockey is not a big deal in France is a major understatement. I often interview fans in the city for my column and whenever I bump into someone from France, they politely decline the invitation to talk about the Canadiens, saying they know little about the sport and would much rather discuss French powerhouse soccer club Paris Saint-Germain.
Could the success of Texier with the bleu blanc rouge change that? On ne sait jamais. It can’t hurt. I think the Canadiens’ ace PR department should send the French hockey player to Laurier Ave. Est to do some outreach for the team among the French ex-pats who hang out at the street’s cafés, bar a vins and fromageries. Pourquoi pas?
There have only ever been a handful of French players in the NHL and the Canadiens actually had one of the other best-known Gallic players in Cristobal Huet, who played goalie here from 2005 to 2008, and for a while he was a pretty good netminder. He’s the only French player to have made an appearance in the NHL All-Star Game.
And, clearly, Texier is thriving since arriving in North America’s leading francophone metropolis. With the Blues this season, he had only a single assist, was playing on the fourth line and was by all accounts quite unhappy with his situation with the team. He already has four goals and six assists in 21 games with Montreal and he’s currently on the top line alongside Nick Suzuki and Cole Caufield.
He looked incredibly happy standing at centre ice with Denis soaking in the love from the Bell Centre faithful and speaking with journalists afterward in the dressing room, saying he’s very pleased to be here in Montreal.
“I’ve never felt as happy as I feel here,” Texier said. “I’ve felt great since the first day in Montreal. I feel it deep inside myself. This is where I want to be.”
It’s cool to hear someone with that French accent doing the postgame interviews. One smart aleck on Facebook wrote me to say he wondered if Marc Denis would have to translate Texier’s Euro French into joual for the crowd.
He comes from Saint-Martin-d’Hères, the same spot in the suburbs of Grenoble where Huet is from, and both played their early hockey with the Brûleurs de Loup in the city. Grenoble is one of the few hot spots for hockey in France. That’s in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of France and who can forget the rowdy South Shore beer-league team in Les Boys 2, the second film in the hit Quebec comedy film series, went there in that film. Pretty funny coincidence.
The Canadiens and the Detroit Red Wings once played a series of games in Paris way back in 1938 and there was a proposal to have the Habs play games in Paris at some point, but the plan seems to be on the back burner. At least it was before Texier lit up the Bell Centre on Wednesday.
Quebec Premier François Legault, a big hockey and Habs fan, was at the game Wednesday to witness Texier’s heroics and afterward he posted the following tweet on X:
I thought Legault was more of a “Vive le Québec libre” guy than “Vive la France,” but maybe he was swept away by the emotion of the moment.
Quebec radio and TV host Marie-Soleil Michon replied to my Facebook on Wednesday about Texier, saying: “What an irony to see him triumph in front of Legault in the crowd … #immigration,” referring to the premier’s efforts to slow down immigration in the province, including by shutting down the Quebec Experience Program (PEQ).
Mathieu Grondin, the nightlife commissioner for Ottawa and a former Montreal nightlife activist, replied to Michon on Facebook saying, with tongue firmly in cheek: “Maybe Texier will save the PEQ.”
I’d say it’s say it’s more likely Texier will convert a few more Montreal French ex-pats to the religion that is the Montreal Canadiens.
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