By Will MacLaren, Features Writer

The year that ushered in the new millennium endured significant chaos in, of all places, the ranks of major-junior hockey.

With the Memorial Cup making its way to the Maritimes – specifically, Halifax – for the first time in the spring of 2000, plenty of eyes were on the QMJHL. The host Mooseheads were assured a spot at the event. The battle to become the second ‘Q’ representative resulted in something of an arms race. Thanks to eager management in Moncton and Quebec – where both the Wildcats and the re-incarnation of the Remparts were fixated on chasing a first title – plus an extended trade period, players were changing uniforms quicker than performers backstage at a Broadway show. It wasn’t a matter of if one of these teams would descend upon Nova Scotia that May; rather, it was a matter of which one.

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The answer was neither. Quietly, methodically, the Rimouski Oceanic were creating something special. “To be honest, I think the organization had it in their mind that it was going to be a good year,” said Jonathan Beaulieu, captain of that year’s Oceanic squad. “They were pretty confident. But we didn’t start thinking about a championship until we got there. We very much had a day-to-day mentality. There was no real talk of the Memorial Cup at the start of the year.”

Just two years removed from a berth in the league final, the Oceanic went through that season steadily, led by holdovers such as Beaulieu and future two-time Stanley Cup-winner Brad Richards, who centered the top line with Jan-Philipp Cadieux and future New York Islander and Florida Panther Juraj Kolnik. Augmenting this group was another future NHLer, Michel Ouellet. The blueline had a mix of everything. Scoring from Michel Periard, toughness from Shawn Scanzano and Joe Rullier, stability in Rene Vydareny and youth in Brent MacLellan and soon-to-be Columbus Blue Jacket Aaron Johnson. Between the pipes, Sebastien Caron, in his first season as the starter, carried the bulk of the load.

Brad Richards (Photos courtesy of Rimouski Oceanic/QMJHL)

Kolnik still distinctly recalls the vibe around the team. “We knew we had something special and we could do something different,” he said. “From Day 1, all of us clicked. Players, coaches, even the fans. That was the main thing. Even if we had one passenger along for the ride, we would’ve lost. We knew we were in a position where we could do some damage.”

Damage was indeed done. By the time the regular season ended, it was the Oceanic – not the Wildcats, Mooseheads or Remparts – who topped the QMJHL standings. The Oceanic finished 1999-2000 with 370 goals. In more than two decades since, only one team, the 2000-01 Shawinigan Cataractes (375), has exceeded that total. No player since that season has eclipsed the 186 points Richards managed in 1999-2000.

Juraj Kolnik (Photos courtesy of Rimouski Oceanic/QMJHL)

Juraj Kolnik was the sniper on Rimouski’s first line, racking up 53 goals in just 47 regular-season games.

The first line accounted for 402 regular-season points. Kolnik produced 53 goals in just 47 games. But the remarkable nature of this group went far beyond numbers. “The No. 1 thing was having the tools,” Kolnik said. “The chemistry between us was simple. We were three different types of players. We had a goal-scorer, a playmaker and a grinder in (Cadieux).”

Beaulieu concurs with his former teammate’s assessment. “We gained a lot of confidence with the performance of our first line,” he said. “(Caron) kept us in games all year. If I recall correctly, we didn’t have any major injuries. Our mindset was to control what we could control. It actually ended up working for us. The confidence the organization gave us was reflected in our performance on the ice.”

"Our mindset was to control what we could control. It ended up working for us."

- Jonathan Beaulieu

That confidence came from the top down, cultivated by coach Doris Labonte. By then a seasoned veteran behind the bench, Labonte was a master at maximizing potential. “I always thought the role of a coach was to get the best out of everybody on the team, and he was able to do that,” Beaulieu said. “But not only that, he was able to make each individual accept their own role. He was exceptional at things like that. At the end of the day, if you were a superstar or a guy not playing that much, his message to everyone was that you can still contribute.”

Labonte indeed got contributions from up and down the lineup. And one of the key contributors for a team that went 12-2 through the QMJHL post-season – defeating juggernauts Halifax and Moncton in the process before eliminating the Hull Olympiques in the final – was Caron. He was the new No. 1 in town and fresh off his first NHL training camp in Pittsburgh. “We had a good bond,” Caron said. “Everything was clicking, plus you need the hockey Gods to be with you. I know it’s cliché, but we approached things one game at a time. Win today, and, if we couldn’t, win tomorrow.”

Winning became the norm in Rimouski. The Oceanic’s longest slide was a four-gamer in early October. In the season’s second half, they enjoyed a seven-game winning streak, which was quickly followed by an 11-game unbeaten run.

Periard was a prime example of the club’s roster-building forte. Rather than a higher-priced mid-season acquisition, the Oceanic acquired the blueliner from Shawinigan before the season began. When he arrived, the message from Labonte was simple. “Give the puck to Brad,” Periard said with a laugh. “I guess it was the right message. Brad knew what to do with the puck once he had it.”

Periard knew how to get the puck to him, too. Only 17 defensemen in league history have cracked the century mark for points. Periard, who registered exactly 100 that year, is one of them. “Everyone bought in and knew their roles from the start,” he said. “It was a tough season, but everyone pushing the same way made it easier. It was one of the best seasons of my entire career. We built the expectations as we went.”

By the time the Oceanic landed in Halifax, the expectations were clear. Nobody expected them there, which was a narrative they used to their advantage. In fact, each team at that year’s tournament had a distinct narrative.

After losing in four straight games to the Oceanic in the league quarterfinal, the host Mooseheads filled their time by firing coach Bob Mongrain, promoting his former assistant Shawn MacKenzie, giving everybody a couple of days off and not playing a game of any consequence for 40 days. Refreshed and with a new voice, the team reached the tournament semifinal.

If there was a bigger surprise than the Oceanic at the tournament, it was the Kootenay Ice. After a respectable 102-point WHL campaign, the club upset a historically strong Calgary Hitmen squad in their division final behind the remarkable goaltending of 16-year-old Dan Blackburn. They completed their run to the East Coast by eliminating the Spokane Chiefs in a six-game final.

The Rimouski Oceanic pose for a photo with the Memorial Cup. (Photos courtesy of Rimouski Oceanic/QMJHL)

Then there were the Barrie Colts. The Colts featured league MVP and future NHL coach Sheldon Keefe. Before he reached an NHL bench, he was best known for declining to shake hands with OHL commissioner David Branch following the Colts’ title-clinching game. Right winger Ryan Barnes took a 25-game suspension for wielding his stick like a Louisville Slugger, and defenseman Shawn Cation was suspended 15 games for inciting a brawl. Mike Jefferson, soon to be Mike Danton and soon to be incarcerated, was, in exceedingly diplomatic terms, an almost surgical superpest. Three members of the club were embroiled in allegations of sexual misconduct. Yet, through it all, the Colts survived two Game 7s in the OHL playoffs to capture the title in a winner-take-all contest in Plymouth against the Whalers. That game did not feature their bench boss, Bill Stewart, who was denied access into the United States after smuggling one of his European players, Ukrainian Vladimir Chernenko, across the border under the team’s bus due to insufficient paperwork.

Needless to say, the Oceanic weren’t exactly the focal point. They were even less so when the Colts walked out of the tournament’s opening banquet prior to Branch’s speech. That got Barrie dinged with a fine. What didn’t get the Colts fined – but nonetheless got them press – were Jefferson’s comments about Richards. The combative Colt claimed Richards “wouldn’t last five games in the OHL.”

Meanwhile, the Oceanic focused on the games at hand. And their coach did the talking for them. “There was a lot of talk,” Beaulieu said. “And to credit Doris, he was very good at handling those situations. He told us to ignore all of it and just focus on our games. He took on the comments, expressed himself well and led the way in that regard.”

Rimouski opened their tournament with a 3-1 victory over Kootenay that, in hindsight, allowed the group to overcome some early jitters. “I felt we were nervous during the first game,” Periard said. “But once we came out of that with the win, we did a good job of managing the pressure, the media, all of it, really.”

After the Oceanic trounced the Colts 7-2 in their second game, the battle for a bye to the final was an all ‘Q’ affair. As they did in the post-season, the Oceanic emerged on top, 5-3. Looking back, Caron and his teammates saw something of a roadmap to the last game of the year and followed it to perfection. “We felt we were underdogs at the Memorial Cup, but if we could catch Halifax at the right time, we could take them,” Caron said. “Barrie was all over the place. And Kootenay, if we beat them, we were good. Plus, we had the advantage of being rested. That really was the key.”

After Barrie eliminated the host Mooseheads in the semifinal, it was time for the bad boys to meet the strong, silent kids from Rimouski again. Thanks to a blend of support for the last QMJHL club standing, contempt for the Colts and a Rimouski squad featuring four Maritimers in the lineup, the Halifax crowd was far from quiet. They cheered the Oceanic on to their first national title, a 6-2 decision over the OHL Champs. But it was a scoreless first period that initially sprung to Beaulieu’s mind. “We might’ve played our worst period of hockey in the playoffs in the first period of the final,” he said. “Fortunately (Caron) was there. Doris basically told us, ‘You got lucky. You won’t get lucky like this for three periods. Don’t ruin this.’ That’s when the big guns came out and turned the game around for us.”

"For sure that fired me up. Hopefully, he'll shut up and realize who I am."

- Brad Richards in 2000

CHL commissioner David Branch hands off the 2000 Memorial Cup to Oceanic captain Jonathan Beaulieu. (Photos courtesy of Rimouski Oceanic/QMJHL)

After a 186-point season, Brad Richards capped things off with the Memorial Cup and MVP honors.

Richards skated off with the Stafford Smythe Memorial Trophy as tournament MVP, not to mention a shiny new contract from the Tampa Bay Lightning. He also had a parting comment for his Ontarian counterpart. “For sure that fired me up,” Richards said after the final horn of Jefferson’s jibes. “When a guy like that says something like that, you have to wonder what he’s talking about. Hopefully, he’ll shut up and realize who I am.”

Four years later, after Richards won the Stanley Cup and Conn Smythe Trophy, every fan knew who he was.

As for the tournament’s other teams, the Kootenay Ice went from 0-3 in 2000 to CHL champions in 2002, with Blackburn once more leading the way. The Nathan MacKinnon-led Mooseheads claimed a Memorial Cup of their own in 2013 and nearly did it again as the host team in 2019. The Colts went on to convert serious damage control into a solid franchise base, but they have yet to return to the Memorial Cup.

Doris Labonte (Photos courtesy of Rimouski Oceanic/QMJHL)

This year, the Oceanic will attempt to go for Memorial Cup No. 2, this time as hosts themselves. And they didn’t look like a team content on backing into the event. They posted the league’s second-best record (behind Moncton) before sweeping Charlottetown in the first round of the playoffs.

(Photos courtesy of Rimouski Oceanic/QMJHL)

Many members of the 2000 Oceanic already have their schedules cleared to attend the Memorial Cup in late May.

The man who brought the Oceanic together a quarter-century ago would go on to lead the Sidney Crosby version of the club to a league title in 2005. Doris Labonte left the bench for good two years later. In 2023, he passed away after a battle with cancer.

Periard is now a coach himself, based out of Sherbrooke. After two seasons as an assistant with the QMJHL Phoenix, he is now winding down his first year as coach at Bishop’s College School. He gives full credit to the man who made him a champion. “Doris took charge,” Periard said. “For a tournament as special as that one, you need someone that can offer you some security. That’s what he did. It’s a big reason why we went undefeated. I wish every player could experience it. “I still tell my players about that team. I love watching them grow and learn about the game. It’s my passion to try and bring out the best in them. I think Doris gave me that passion.”

This article appeared in our 2025 Top-100 NHLers issue. This issue focuses on the 100 best players currently in the NHL, with the Avalanche's Nathan MacKinnon sitting atop the list. We also include features on Alex Ovechkin finally beating Wayne Gretzky's goal-scoring record, and former CFL running back Andrew Harris' switch to semi-professional hockey. In addition, we provide a PWHL playoff preview as the regular season nears its end.

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