André Joseph Lacroix (born June 5, 1945)
Played for: Philadelphia Flyers (1967-1971), Chicago Black Hawks (1971-1972), Philadelphia Blazers (1972-1973), New York Golden Blades/Jersey Knights (1973-1974), San Diego Mariners (1974-1977), Houston Aeros (1977-1978), New England/Hartford Whalers (1978-1980)
NHL stats: 79 goals, 119 assists, 198 points in 325 games (16 playoff games [2 G, 5A, 7 P]
WHA stats: 251 goals, 547 assists, 798 points in 551 games (48 playoff games [27 G, 32 A, 59 P])
Professional hockey total: 330 goals, 666 assists for 996 points in 876 games
(74 playoff games - 29 goals, 37 assists, 66 points)
2x Bill Hunter Trophy (1972-73, 1974-75)
3x WHA First-Team All-Star Team (1972-1975)
Admittedly, the Hockey Hall of Fame doesn't really honor its goal: honoring the best players of hockey, not just the NHL. But this blog is a haven for the World Hockey Association and all of the great things that it did for the sport of hockey. Not every player gets their due. Born in Lauzon, Quebec to a Catholic family, Andre Lacroix first excelled in junior hockey for the Quebec Citadelles and the Peteborough Petes in the early 1960s, with Lacroix winning back-to-back awards for his outstanding play in the OHL (1965, 1966). He rose up to the American Hockey League with the Quebec Aces before getting to play in the National Hockey League in February 1968 for the expansion team Philadelphia Flyers; in 18 games, he had six goals and eight assists and made the playoff roster. He had two goals and three assists in the Quarterfinals, but the West Division champion* Flyers were beaten in seven games by the St. Louis Blues. Lacroix made the roster for the Flyers in the 1968-69 season. The 23-year-old led the team in goals (24) and points (56) and even received votes for the Calder Trophy (rookie of the year award) but the Flyers were beaten in the playoffs by the Blues once again, with Lacroix having no statistics in four games. The 1969-70 team (which happened to be the first with Bobby Clarke) finished 5th, but Lacroix led the team in points with 58 on 22 goals and 36 assists. In what ended up as his final season with the Flyers, Lacroix had 42 points (4th best to players such as Clarke and Serge Bernier) while recording two assists in the Stanley Cup playoffs as the Flyers were swept by Chicago. Lacroix had fond memories of owner Ed Snider, calling him the best owner he played for once. Prior to the 1971-72 season, Lacroix was traded to the Chicago Black Hawks. He played in 51 games but had just 11 points in a frustrating year. But his career had a new phase ahead.
Sure, maybe there is an argument against the World Hockey Association not being the coolest thing ever for players (but I don't care). Teams badly needed talent to play for them to try and garner attention, and the upstart Philadelphia Blazers (who actually were originally intended to play in Miami as the "Screaming Eagles" before it went under) needed it badly for the 1972-73 season, and Lacroix (alongside others such as Derek Sanderson, John McKenzie, and Bernie Parent) fit the bill. Of course, the Blazers did not exactly do very well at first (due to injuries), with the team losing their first seven games and being 5–16 before December 1. But Lacroix, alongside right-winger Danny Lawson, persevered, with each contributing 50 goals and 100 points each as the Blazers battled all the way back to a record of 38–40–0 (yes, that means the Blazers went 33–24 from December 1, with no games ending in a tie). Lacroix scored a total of 124 points (50 goals, 74 assists) to win the points title (the WHA named their trophy after Bill Hunter, co-founder of the Alberta/Edmonton Oilers). The third-place Blazers met the second-place Cleveland Crusaders in the Quarterfinals of the eight-team WHA playoffs. He had two assists, but the series was overshadowed by Parent leaving the team after Game 1 due to a contract dispute as the Crusaders swept the Blazers. The Blazers, who played in the Philadelphia Civic Center to middling crowds while the Flyers were a season away from Stanley Cup domination, decided to move to Vancouver.
Lacroix did not want to play in Vancouver and was soon traded to the New York Golden Blades. The WHA experiment failed easily in one place: the New York area, as the Golden Blades was a rebrand away from "New York Raiders", even though they played in the same place as before: tenants to the New York Rangers at Madison Square Garden (this came about because the Nassau County officials did not want the Raiders to play at the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum and spearheaded a push to get a team there, which led to the Islanders). The team moved midway through the season to become the Jersey Knights and won 32 games (actually one less than the year before) while Lacroix recorded 80 assists and 31 goals for 111 points, narrowly losing the points title to Mike Walton. The team moved to San Diego to become the Mariners in the offseason (effectively making them the original pro team named the Mariners, albeit without nearly 50 years of failure). The Mariners never drew great with the fans, but Lacroix and company made the playoffs in all three seasons played there, even winning a playoff series in the first two years. He won the points title in 1974-75 with a historic year, scoring 41 goals and a whopping 106 points. It was the record for assists by a professional hockey player (Bobby Orr had 102 in 1970-71) until it was surpassed in 1980 by Wayne Gretzky (for reference, only Gretzky, Mario Lemieux, Connor McDavid and Nikita Kucherov have had 100-assist seasons since Lacroix).
The dissolution of the Mariners in 1977 saw him move over to the Houston Aeros, in what ended up as the last season of the team (their owner had tried to get the Aeros into the NHL but found little interest). On a team with guys such as Morris Lukowich and John Gray, Lacroix had 77 assists and 36 goals for 113 total points as the third-place Aeros met the Quebec Nordiques in the 1978 playoffs. Lacroix had two goals and assists each but the Aeros were hammered in six games. When the team folded, Lacroix went over to the New England Whalers (after being traded by the Winnipeg Jets, who briefly had his rights when the Aeros traded him) for what proved to be his swansong. In the final year of the WHA, the 33-year old Lacroix, playing 78 games on a team with Mark Howe (future Hall of Famer, by the way) and his father Gordie, Lacroix had his first non-100 point season in years but contributed 32 goals and 56 assists for 88 total points as the Whalers narrowly made it to the six-team playoffs. They beat Cincinnati to reach the Semifinals, the closest Lacroix made it to the championship. Lacroix had four assists and goals each in his postseason, but the Edmonton Oilers beat the Whalers in seven games. The 34-year old played 29 games (with his final game coming on December 15, 1979), recording 3 goals and 14 assists for 17 total points.
Nicknamed "The Magician"" Lacroix (who negotiated his own contracts) wrote his autobiography in 2020. If the goal of the Hockey Hall of Fame was to honor players who had consistent power for the sport, Lacroix would've been in years ago, because I doubt many players with nearly 1,000 points before they turned 35 miss out on the great honor (in fact the only not-active players around 1000 career points in their age-34 season not in the Hall are Bernie Nicholls, Vicent Damphousse, Theo Fleury, Bobby Smith, Brian Bellows, Steve Larmer, and Brian Propp). Lacroix had 868 NHL/WHA points from 1970 to 1980 - for comparison, that would be sixth behind five Hall of Famers (Esposito, Lafleur, Dionne, Clarke, Perreault) if the NHL actually recognized the WHA as the trendsetter that it was. The WHA Hall of Fame, a place created to honor the league, did honor Lacroix with induction in 2010 to recognize his clear place as one of the best players of its league.
On behalf of the Unsung Hall of Fame, it is my privilege to welcome André Lacroix to the Hall.
N O T E S
*When the NHL expanded in 1967, they put all six expansion teams in the West Division, guaranteeing a new Stanley Cup matchup from the past 25 years of the same six teams playing each other. After three years of the St. Louis Blues reaching the Stanley Cup Final only to get beaten each time, they changed the playoff format.
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