Réal Lemieux

Réal Lemieux
Date of birth	January 3, 1945
place of birth	Victoriaville , Quebec , Canada
date of death	October 24, 1975
Place of death	Sorel , Quebec , Canada
Nickname	Frenchy
size	180 cm
Weight	78 kg
position	Right wing
Shot hand	Left
Career stations
1963-1965	Hamilton Red Wings
1965-1967	Memphis wings
1967-1969	Los Angeles Kings
1969-1970	New York Rangers
1970-1973	Los Angeles Kings
1973-1974	New York Rangers
1974	Buffalo Sabers

Réal Gaston "Frenchy" Lemieux (born January 3, 1945 in Victoriaville , Québec ; † October 24, 1975 in Sorel , Québec) was a Canadian ice hockey player who played 474 games for the Detroit Red during his playing career between 1963 and 1974 Wings , Los Angeles Kings , New York Rangers and Buffalo Sabers in the National Hockey League (NHL) on the position of right winger .

Career

Lemieux spent his junior years between 1963 and 1965 in the Ontario Hockey Association (OHA), where he played for the Hamilton Red Wings . Over the course of two years, the striker collected 132 scorer points in a total of 90 missions . Before that, he had played for the junior team Lachine Maroons for three years from 1960 . In the spring of 1965, the 20-year-old was then signed by the Detroit Red Wings of the National Hockey League (NHL). The Hamilton Red Wings served the NHL franchise at that time as a talent factory.

At the beginning of his professional career, the French Canadian was used at the end of the 1964/65 season with Detroit's farm team in the Central Professional Hockey League (CPHL), the Memphis Wings . There he spent a total of two complete seasons between 1965 and 1967, in which he played 136 times in the CPHL and collected 104 points scorer. His only assignment for Detroit he completed it during the 1966/67 season . Therefore, he was left unprotected by the Red Wings for the NHL Expansion Draft 1967 , in which the young player was consequently selected by the newly formed Los Angeles Kings . In the service of the Californians, Lemieux spent two good years as a playmaker in a storm series with Bill Flett and Eddie Joyal with at least 35 goal participations before he was transferred to the New York Rangers in June 1969 in exchange for Léon Rochefort and Dennis Hextall . For the Rangers, the attacker completed only 55 games in the 1969/70 season until February 1970. Together with the Swedish talent Juha Widing , he returned to the Los Angeles Kings after only eight months, who gave Ted Irvine to New York for it.

Back in Los Angeles, Lemieux found it difficult to get into the squad and spent large parts of the 1970/71 game year in the squad of the Springfield Kings farm team in the American Hockey League (AHL). It was not until January 1971 - and after he had scored 36 times in 33 games in the AHL - that he was given a regular place in the NHL squad again, which he had secured until the 1973/74 season . After he had remained pointless at the beginning of this season in the first 20 missions for the Kings, he was transferred again to the New York Rangers in late November 1973 together with Gilles Marotte . Sheldon Kannegiesser , Mike Murphy and Tom Williams completed the transfer business with their move to California, which thus comprised a total of five players.

However, Lemieux was not at home with the "Broadway Blueshirts" at the second attempt and so he was transferred again in January 1974 after only seven games played for New York. Within the state of New York he switched to the Buffalo Sabers in exchange for Paul Curtis . In the jersey of the Sabers, the offensive player completed his last eleven NHL games by the end of the season. After Buffalo had no use for him beyond the season and deleted him from the squad, the Canadian ended his active career at the age of 29 before the start of the 1974/75 season .

He died just over a year after retiring in October 1975 at the age of 30 as a result of a cerebral haemorrhage in Sorel in his home province of Québec .

Career statistics

				Regular season						Playoffs
season	team	league		Sp	T	V	Pt	SM		Sp	T	V	Pt	SM
1963/64	Hamilton Red Wings	OHA		42	20th	24	44	58		-	-	-	-	-
1964/65	Hamilton Red Wings	OHA		48	48	40	88	64		-	-	-	-	-
1964/65	Memphis wings	CPHL		8th	5	7th	12	0		-	-	-	-	-
1965/66	Memphis wings	CPHL		53	11	15th	26th	68		-	-	-	-	-
1966/67	Memphis wings	CPHL		68	28	34	62	211		7th	4th	0	4th	7th
1966/67	Detroit Red Wings	NHL		1	0	0	0	0		-	-	-	-	-
1967/68	Los Angeles Kings	NHL		74	12	23	35	60		7th	1	1	2	0
1968/69	Los Angeles Kings	NHL		75	11	29	40	68		11	1	3	4th	10
1969/70	New York Rangers	NHL		55	4th	6th	10	51		-	-	-	-	-
1969/70	Los Angeles Kings	NHL		18th	2	4th	6th	10		-	-	-	-	-
1970/71	Los Angeles Kings	NHL		43	3	6th	9	22nd		-	-	-	-	-
1970/71	Springfield Kings	AHL		33	14th	22nd	36	25th		-	-	-	-	-
1971/72	Los Angeles Kings	NHL		78	13	25th	38	28		-	-	-	-	-
1972/73	Los Angeles Kings	NHL		74	5	10	15th	19th		-	-	-	-	-
1973/74	Los Angeles Kings	NHL		20th	0	0	0	0		-	-	-	-	-
1973/74	New York Rangers	NHL		7th	0	0	0	0		-	-	-	-	-
1973/74	Buffalo Sabers	NHL		11	1	1	2	4th		-	-	-	-	-
OHA total				90	68	64	132	122		-	-	-	-	-
CPHL total				129	44	56	100	279		7th	4th	0	4th	7th
NHL overall				456	51	104	155	262		18th	2	4th	6th	10

( Legend for player statistics: Sp or GP = games played; T or G = goals scored; V or A = assists scored ; Pkt or Pts = scorer points scored ; SM or PIM = penalty minutes received ; +/− = plus / minus balance; PP = overpaid goals scored ; SH = underpaid goals scored ; GW = winning goals scored; ¹  play-downs / relegation )

Web links

• Réal Lemieux at legendsofhockey.net ( Memento from September 8, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
• Réal Lemieux at eliteprospects.com (English)
• Réal Lemieux in the database of Find a Grave (English)