Our 20’s: Baie-Comeau Drakkar
Regular season champion and playoff finalist, the Baie-Comeau Drakkar had to bid farewell to its 20-year-old players, Justin Gill, Émile Chouinard and Isaac Dufort, at the end of the season. Recap.
Isaac Dufort and Émile Chouinard were both selected by the Drakkar in the eighth round of the 2019 Entry Draft: Dufort 132nd and Chouinard 141st overall. Both played one more year in the LHM18AAAQ before cracking the Drakkar’s lineup in 2020-21. And both spent their entire four-season QMJHL careers up North.
Both are part of a select group of players who have played 200 games with the Drakkar. Dufort ranks 21st in franchise history with 224 games played, and 23rd with his 65 goals.
Chouinard, an imposing 6’5″, 210 lb. defenseman, was never known for his offense. However, he gave his 100% every time he played and developed into a very good shutdown defender.
Together, Dufort and Chouinard were instrumental in the Drakkar’s rise from 18th, to 16th, to 10th, and then to 1st overall in the league standings, with the two veterans acting as the club’s key leaders.
Chouinard was a great motivator this year in particular, having to miss 23 games to battle Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a form of cancer. His courage, determination and positivism inspired his teammates towards the end of the season, and he returned to action in the playoffs to help the Drakkar reach the Gilles-Courteau Trophy Final, where the team lost to Drummondville.
At the conclusion of the campaign, Chouinard was awarded the Paul-Dumont Trophy as the QMJHL’s Personality of the Year (alongside Cape Breton’s Jacob Newcombe).
For his part, Dufort – team captain since 2022 – set personal bests with 27 goals and 46 points, convincing the Hartford Wolf Pack, the New York Rangers’ farm club, to sign him to an AHL contract.
Next year, Dufort is likely to face Justin Gill, who is expected to begin his own professional career with the Bridgeport Islanders, the New York Islanders’ affiliate, who drafted him in the fifth round (145th) in 2023.
Gill leaves the QMJHL with 270 points (115-155) in 285 games, most notably finishing second in league scoring this season with 98 points (40-58). Voted to the league’s First All-Star Team, he also dominated with a +57 rating.
Gill was acquired by the Drakkar in the summer of 2023, following a 150-point, 156-game stint with the Sherbrooke Phoenix. To this day, he ranks in the Top 10 for goals, assists and points in Phoenix history.
Sherbrooke acquired Gill from Charlottetown, in return for Patrick Guay, in the middle of the 2020-21 season, just over a year after the Islanders selected him 32nd overall in the 2019 draft.
Dufort and Chouinard, with their longevity, leadership and courage, and Gill, with his offensive talent, will all have left their mark in Baie-Comeau. We wish them every success in their future careers and, above all, in their lives.
