| Maine Nordiques | |
|---|---|
 | |
| City | Lewiston, Maine |
| League | NAHL |
| Operated | 1973-1977 |
| Home arena | Central Maine Youth Center |
| Colors | Red, White and Blue |
| Owner(s) | William Rocheleau, Jr. et al. |
The Maine Nordiques were a professional ice hockey team that operated within the North American Hockey League from 1973 to 1977. They were based at the Central Maine Youth Center in Lewiston, Maine. The Nordiques served as a farm club for the Quebec Nordiques of the World Hockey Association. [1]
The team played for four seasons at Central Maine Youth Center, which had a seating capacity of just 2,800 fans. [2]
The Nordiques were the Quebec Nordiques' top farm club, and were the only professional sports franchise in the state of Maine during the mid-1970s. [2]
The club's all-time leading scorer was Paul Larose, who achieved 179 goals and 248 assists for the team between 1973 and 1977. Larose and Alan Globensky were the only two players to appear in all four seasons. Future National Hockey League players included goaltender Richard Brodeur and defenseman Paul Baxter. [2]
Financial backers of the team included former Lewiston Mayor Bill Rocheleau, who led a group of local businesspeople who backed the Nordiques. Rocheleau also served as league president during the NAHL's final season in the winter of 1976–1977. [2]
| Season | League | Games | Won | Lost | Tied | Points | Winning % | Goals for | Goals against | Standing |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1973–74 | NAHL | 74 | 45 | 26 | 3 | 93 | 0.628 | 398 | 309 | Lost in round 1 |
| 1974–75 | NAHL | 74 | 27 | 46 | 1 | 55 | 0.372 | 266 | 394 | Out of Playoffs |
| 1975–76 | NAHL | 74 | 18 | 55 | 1 | 37 | 0.250 | 295 | 450 | Lost in round 1 |
| 1976–77 | NAHL | 74 | 40 | 29 | 5 | 85 | 0.574 | 311 | 284 | Lost in finals |
Lewiston is the second most populous city in the U.S. state of Maine, with the city's population at 37,121 as of the 2020 United States Census. The city lies halfway between Augusta, the state's capital, and Portland, the state's most populous city. It is one-half of the Lewiston–Auburn Metropolitan Statistical Area, commonly referred to as "L/A." or "L-A." Lewiston exerts a significant impact upon the diversity, religious variety, commerce, education, and economic power of Maine. It is known for having an overall low cost of living, substantial access to medical care, and a low violent-crime rate. In recent years, the city of Lewiston has also seen a spike in economic and social growth. While the dominant language spoken in the city is English, it is home to a significant Somali population as well as the largest French-speaking population in the United States while it is second to St. Martin Parish, Louisiana, in percentage of speakers.
The Quebec Maritimes Junior Hockey League is one of the three major junior ice hockey leagues that constitute the Canadian Hockey League. Officially the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League until 2023, the league includes teams in Quebec and the Maritime provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island.
The World Hockey Association was a professional ice hockey major league that operated in North America from 1972 to 1979. It was the first major league to compete with the National Hockey League (NHL) since the collapse of the Western Hockey League in 1926. Although the WHA was not the first league since that time to attempt to challenge the NHL's supremacy, it was by far the most successful in the modern era.
Guy Damien Lafleur, nicknamed "the Flower" and "Le Démon Blond", was a Canadian professional ice hockey player. He was the first player in National Hockey League (NHL) history to score 50 goals in six consecutive seasons as well as 50 goals and 100 points in six consecutive seasons. Between 1971 and 1991, Lafleur played right wing for the Montreal Canadiens, New York Rangers, and Quebec Nordiques in an NHL career spanning 17 seasons, and five Stanley Cup championships in 1973, 1976, 1977, 1978, and 1979. Lafleur was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1988, named one of the 100 Greatest NHL Players in history in 2017, and was named to the Order of Hockey in Canada in 2022.
The Quebec Nordiques were a professional ice hockey team based in Quebec City. The Nordiques played in the World Hockey Association (1972–1979) and the National Hockey League (1979–1995). The franchise was relocated to Denver, Colorado in May 1995 and renamed the Colorado Avalanche. They played their home games at the Colisée de Québec from 1972 to 1995.
The Lewiston Maineiacs were a junior ice hockey team of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League based in Lewiston, Maine, United States. The team played its home games at the Androscoggin Bank Colisée. They were the second QMJHL team in the United States, and the only one to play a full season. They won the President's Cup in 2007, becoming the only American based franchise to accomplish the feat.
The Colisée, formerly Androscoggin Bank Colisée, Central Maine Youth Center, Central Maine Civic Center, and Lewiston Colisee, is a 4,000 capacity multi-purpose arena, in Lewiston, Maine, United States that was built from 1956 to 1958 and opened in the latter year to replace the Dominics Regional High School Arena and was initially constructed and operated by the Catholic parish of SS. Peter and Paul. It was used as a replacement venue for the boxing match between Muhammad Ali and Sonny Liston in 1965.
The Sherbrooke Castors or Beavers was the name of two different junior ice hockey teams in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League and another team in the Quebec Eastern Provincial Hockey League. Both later franchises played at the Palais des Sports in Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada.
The Maine Mariners were two separate professional ice hockey teams in the American Hockey League. They both played in Portland, Maine, at the Cumberland County Civic Center.
Joseph Henri Jean-Claude Tremblay was a Canadian professional ice hockey defenceman for the Montreal Canadiens of the National Hockey League (NHL) and the Quebec Nordiques of the World Hockey Association (WHA), notable for play-making and defensive skills.
Joseph Gérard Marquis Tardif is a Canadian former professional ice hockey left winger who played in both the National Hockey League (NHL) and the World Hockey Association (WHA), principally for the Quebec Nordiques, and is the all-time leading goal scorer in the WHA.
Réal Cloutier is a Canadian former professional ice hockey player. Cloutier spent five prolific seasons as a winger in the World Hockey Association (WHA) with the Quebec Nordiques. After the WHA folded, he played an additional five seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL), still at a point-a-game scoring pace, with the Quebec Nordiques and the Buffalo Sabres.
The Quebec Aces, also known in French as Les As de Québec, were an amateur and later a professional men's ice hockey team from Quebec City, Quebec.
The 1975 Memorial Cup took place May 3–11 at the Kitchener Memorial Auditorium Complex in Kitchener, Ontario. It was the 57th annual Memorial Cup competition, organized by the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association (CAHA) to determine the champion of major junior A ice hockey. Participating teams were the winners of the Ontario Major Junior Hockey League, Quebec Major Junior Hockey League and Western Hockey League which were the Toronto Marlboros, Sherbrooke Castors and New Westminster Bruins. Toronto won their 7th Memorial Cup, defeating New Westminster in the final game.
Michel Joseph Archambault was a Canadian ice hockey left winger. He played 57 games in the World Hockey Association with the Quebec Nordiques during the 1972–73 season and 3 games in the National Hockey League with the Chicago Black Hawks during the 1976–77 season. The rest of his career, which lasted from 1970 to 1978, was mainly spent in the minor leagues.
The 1989–90 Quebec Nordiques season was the Nordiques 11th season in the National Hockey League.
The Long Island Cougars were a minor league professional ice hockey team that played at the Long Island Arena in Commack, New York, from 1973 to 1975. The Cougars were a member of the North American Hockey League, and were runners up for the Lockhart Trophy to the Syracuse Blazers in the 1973–74 season.
The Maine Nordiques were a Tier III Junior "A" ice hockey team from Lewiston, Maine. The team was a member of the North American 3 Hockey League (NA3HL) since 2016 and played home games at the Androscoggin Bank Colisée since 2015. The franchise relocated several times under the operation of the Fighting Spirit organization before it was sold to the Colisée owner, Jim Cain, in 2017.
The Maine Nordiques are a Tier II junior ice hockey team in the North American Hockey League's East Division. The Nordiques play their home games at world renowned Androscoggin Bank Colisée in Lewiston, Maine.
 | This American ice hockey team-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
 | This article about a sports team in Maine is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |