A tale of two cities: Wildcats, Remparts vie for 2028 Memorial Cup host rights
By Will MacLaren
One of most difficult jobs in junior hockey over the coming months will be determining which one of two QMJHL flagship franchises, the Moncton Wildcats or Quebec Remparts, will be named host team for the 2028 Memorial Cup presented by Kubota. The good news is there’s not really a wrong answer.
After purchasing the team, formerly known as the Alpines, from the league in 1996, the late Robert Irving set about putting Moncton on the map as a junior hockey destination with the newly rechristened Wildcats. The team has boasted three decades of sustained success at the gate in Moncton while also providing a professional atmosphere for every player that has walked into their dressing room.
The on-ice results speak for themselves – three QMJHL playoff titles, two regular season championships and dozens of alumni who have suited up in the NHL. The business side of the organization has been a success in its own right, consistently among the league leaders in attendance while hosting numerous QMJHL and CHL marquee events over the years such as the 2006 Memorial Cup, the former Canada/Russia Series and the QMJHL draft. Additionally, Moncton hosted Group B action at the 2023 IIHF World Junior Hockey Championship.
While much of the team’s history had been written within the confines of the Moncton Coliseum, including that 2006 tournament host stint, the Wildcats now play their home games at the Avenir Centre, a state-of-the-art 8,800 seat venue in the hearth of downtown Moncton that was completed in 2018, a perfect representation of the city’s standing as a first-class hockey town and an area of the region synonymous with substantial growth.
The Remparts represent a junior hockey renaissance in Quebec’s capital city. The team, purchased by a group that included legendary goaltender Patrick Roy and fellow investors Michel Cardina and Jacques Tanguay and relocated from the nearby suburb of Beauport, proved to be as much a hit with the local fans as their 1970’s predecessors.
And after back-to-back regular season titles under its new ownership, it became obvious the team was outgrowing its first home on the campus of the Universite de Laval. The Remparts moved into the venerable Colisee in the fall of 1999. It proved to be a match made in heaven. From that day to this, the Remparts remain the attendance juggernauts of the QMJHL.
They’ve also rewarded their fans with a pair of Memorial Cup titles in 2006 and 2023. The city has also hosted the tournament on two occasions, first in 2003 and again in 2015. That year’s Championship game, a thrilling 2-1 overtime victory by the Oshawa Generals over the Kelowna Rockets, would be the last competitive game contested at the 66-year-old Colisee. Today, the team calls the Videotron Center home. They are, in fact, a ‘Q’ team playing in an NHL-calibre arena. When not hosting hundreds of thousands of rabid Remparts fans during the season, the arena is a key entertainment hub for much of Eastern Canada.
These two teams are no strangers to one another when it comes to high-stakes drama on the ice. This time, even though the competition moves off ice, the calibre of opponent is no less impressive.
