QMJHL: behind the scenes of the four years that led to the Drummondville Voltigeurs championship

The Drummondville Voltigeurs are QMJHL champions. A conquest doesn’t happen overnight and the Drummondville organization has seen the culmination of a plan that began during the 2019-2020 season, four years ago.

The newspaper takes you behind the scenes of the crucial moments that allowed the Voltigeurs to lift the Gilles-Courteau trophy on May 14.

Trade Dawson Mercer or not?

The cornerstone of building this winning team was truly laid during the holiday trading period of the 2019-2020 season.

At that time, the Voltigeurs were recovering from a heartbreaking defeat in the QMJHL semi-final and had just lost several big players, Maxime Comtois, Joe Veleno, Pierre-Olivier Joseph and Nicolas Beaudin, in particular. The team still relied on Dawson Mercer and Xavier Simoneau and, internally, not everyone got along. Some believed that the Voltigeurs could hope to try his luck again, but that was not the opinion of the team’s general manager, Philippe Boucher.

He finally made the decision to trade Mercer to the Chicoutimi Saguenéens in return for two first round picks, two second and another fourth. Several of these choices made it possible to acquire key pieces of the conquest, but we will return to that.

“I didn’t see how we could have surrounded Mercer and Simoneau to get the cup. Some disagreed, but the majority thought it was best to trade Mercer. It’s never pleasant to trade good players like that, but Dawson was aware of our plan and we kept him informed throughout the process.

A crucial draft

The 2021 draft will have literally laid the foundations of the core of the Drummondville Voltigeurs.

The organization hit the nail on the head with its first four picks: they selected the one who would become their captain, Luke Woodworth, in the first round as did defenseman Maveric Lamoureux with a pick obtained in the Mercer transaction.

The Voltigeurs then return to the hotel with the feeling of having accomplished their duty, after this first round. The next day, they held the very first selection of the second round, also acquired in the Dawson Mercer trade. This choice is highly coveted every year since many teams hope to claim players that they had classified in the first round but who slipped.

After listening to the offers and speaking to his staff, Boucher ultimately decided to keep the choice. The reason? The small and dynamic forward Justin Côté is still available.

“After studying the offers, our decision was clear: we could not let Côté pass,” recalls Boucher.

The Voltigeurs then conclude the second round with the selection of goalkeeper Riley Mercer, Dawson’s brother. The latter was phenomenal for the Voltigeurs in the playoffs, particularly in the final.

“We really liked these four players and I think they all exceeded our expectations,” recognizes Voltigeurs head scout Jean-Sébastien Perron. Especially Riley Mercer. Due to COVID, we brought him with us at 16 and he didn’t play much hockey in his first seasons. I often heard people say that was the question mark for us in the playoffs and I really didn’t agree.

“My first decision and my best”

In February 2023, Philippe Boucher announced his resignation as general manager of the Voltigeurs de Drummondville, for personal reasons, including health. The team therefore ends the season then announces during the summer the hiring of Yanick Lemay, a former recruiter of the Winnipeg Jets, as successor to Boucher.

As soon as he disembarked, he and the team’s head coach Éric Bélanger decided to put an end to their association. A month later, the head coach of the Halifax Mooseheads surprised everyone by announcing his departure from the team.

He automatically becomes the number one candidate in Lemay’s eyes.

“I had often had the opportunity to speak to Sylvain as part of my work as a scout and we had always had a connection. When we spoke, I found that we shared the same values ​​and that we saw the game in the same way. I didn’t wait too long before calling him and as soon as I spoke to him, it confirmed that this is what I was looking for. It was important to have a coach from the new generation,” Lemay told us.

The latter ultimately did an excellent job behind the Voltigeurs bench, being one of the finalists for the Ron-Lapointe Trophy awarded to the coach of the year in the QMJHL.

“It was pretty much my first decision and my best,” adds the general manager.

The arrival of a local star

Sherbrooke. A transaction that has been discussed for two years!

“The day the Phoenix drafted Gauthier [au premier rang au total en 2021]I started talking to Stéphane Julien about the possibility of having him in Drummondville at 18,” said Philippe Boucher, laughing.

Talks had therefore begun when Lemay arrived in office.

“When I arrived, the house was in order,” explained Lemay. So I already knew quite a bit what the price would be, but nothing was done and no one imposed anything on me internally. It was a month of pretty intense discussions, until the draft. He was a player that I liked and we decided to make the transaction.

Gauthier therefore automatically became the local headliner of the organization, with all that that entails.

“I’m so proud of Ethan. People don’t realize how demanding a draft year is and, after that, he gets traded to his hometown team for a pretty hefty bill. There is a pressure that comes with that. […] At the beginning, he had good streaks and not so good ones. During the holidays, he went to the cottage, away from hockey, and when he came back, we felt like he was somewhere else. We saw the real Ethan,” mentions Lemay.

The finishing touch to the holidays

Lemay then went all out during the holiday season, being the general manager making the most major acquisitions. He first acquired the man who would ultimately become the playoffs’ MVP, defenseman Vsevolod Komarov and Mikaël Huchette from the Quebec Remparts, then managed to get his hands on Alexis Gendron when it became clear that the The Flyers’ school club, the Lehigh Valley Phantoms, would return him to the junior ranks. Lemay then concluded by making another transaction with the Remparts, this time to get his hands on the obscure hero of the Red Devils’ conquests in 2023, Kassim Gaudet.

In total, these four elements will have cost two first round picks, four second, three third and one fourth in addition to the young Loïc Goyette, Mavrick Rousseau-Hamel and the European Nino Tomov.

A prize which, in the end, will have allowed you to get your hands on the big trophy. For Lemay, moreover, this work could not have been accomplished without the work of his recruiters.

“People don’t talk much about recruiters and I know what I’m talking about since I’ve been in that situation. Jean-Sébastien Perron and his team did a lot of work to find players, not necessarily in the first rounds, but who would be drafted much higher today. Next year, we have several young people who will return and that allowed me to let more choices go this year because we have depth. We will not leave with a blank page.”