Jean-Sébastien Giguère

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Position Goaltender
Catches Left
Nickname(s) J.S, Jiggy
Height
Weight		 6 ft 1 in (1.85 m)
201 lb (91 kg/14 st 5 lb)
NHL Team
F. teams		 Anaheim Ducks
Hartford Whalers
Calgary Flames
Nationality Flag of Canada Canada
Born May 16, 1977 (1977-05-16) (age 31),
Montreal, QC, CAN
NHL Draft 13th overall, 1995
Hartford Whalers
Pro career 1997 – present

Jean-Sébastien Giguère (born May 16, 1977, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada) is a French Canadian professional hockey goaltender currently playing for the Anaheim Ducks of the National Hockey League. He was drafted 13th overall by the Hartford Whalers in the 1995 NHL Entry Draft. He has played for the Verdun Collège-Français, Halifax Mooseheads, Hartford Whalers, Saint John Flames, Calgary Flames, Cincinnati Mighty Ducks and Mighty Ducks of Anaheim.

Contents

[edit] Playing career

[edit] NHL beginnings

After brief and overall-mediocre stints in the Hartford and Calgary organizations, Giguere was traded by the Flames to the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim for a 2nd round selection in the 2000 NHL Entry Draft. He began the 2000-01 season with the Ducks' farm team in Cincinnati, until he was recalled to their parent club for 34 games. After working with famous goalie coach François Allaire, Giguere regained the confidence he showed in juniors and quickly became Anaheim's newest starter. In the 2002-03 season, "Jiggy" enjoyed the best season of his NHL career-to-date, with 34 wins, a .920 save percentage and an impressive 8 shutouts. Jiggy lead the Ducks to their first Stanley Cup in team history in 2007 with strong performance in the playoffs by going 13-4 with GAA of 1.97 and SV% of 0.922.

[edit] 2003 Playoffs

During the 2003 Stanley Cup Playoffs, Giguere led the Mighty Ducks to the Stanley Cup Finals, where they lost in seven games to the New Jersey Devils. He won the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player of the playoffs for his efforts in series wins against the Detroit Red Wings, Dallas Stars and Minnesota Wild and pushing the Finals to the seven game limit. He was a perfect 7-0 in overtime, setting a record for longest amount of playoff overtime played without allowing a goal at 168 minutes, 27 seconds, including multiple overtime victories in Game 1 of each of the first three series. He also held the Wild to an all-time best-of-7 series low of one goal in the entire Western Conference Finals, posting a shutout streak of 217 minutes, 54 seconds during that series. He finished with a 15-6 record, a 1.62 Goals Against Average and .945 Save Percentage (the best of all playoff goaltenders that year), and fewer losses than his Finals counterpart Martin Brodeur. He was the fifth player to receive the Conn Smythe Trophy playing for the losing team, the first since Philadelphia's Ron Hextall in 1987.

[edit] Recent years

Giguere in action.
Giguere in action.

After being rewarded with a large contract in the off-season, Giguère was inconsistent throughout much of the 2003-04 season as the Ducks missed the playoffs. Some hockey pundits speculated that he may have been rattled by coming so close to winning the Stanley Cup the previous season, yet ultimately failing.

After the lockout canceled the 2004-05 season, Giguere returned for the '05-'06 season and appeared to have regained a level of play approaching his 2003 glory. In April 2006, he and the Ducks again entered the Stanley Cup Playoffs, but were eliminated in the Western Finals by the Edmonton Oilers. Giguere appeared in just 4 games before being replaced in net by Russian rookie Ilya Bryzgalov. With the first round series on the line, management seemed to have lost faith in Jiggy. In fact, Giguere's club record of consecutive playoff shutout minutes was broken by his backup's surprising string of three consecutive shutouts. His overtime playoff shutout record however was extended to 8-0 but was ended April 27, 2007 in the second overtime against the Canucks.

Facing the prospect of being an unrestricted free agent at the end of the 2006-2007 season, Giguère started out hot and won his starting role back. In the first month of the season, October 2006, he did not lose a single game in regulation. He proceeded to put up the best numbers of his career, finishing with a record of 36-10-7.

Giguere won the Stanley Cup in a 6-2 game five win against the Ottawa Senators on June 6, 2007.

Before winning the Stanley Cup in 2007, Giguere had a son named Maxime. Due to this, he was unable to play in the first three games of the 2007 Western Conference Quarterfinals. In game three Ilya Bryzgalov was pulled and it was Giguere's turn to shine.

The size of Giguere's goalie pads caused minor controversy: Brett Hull said "Giguere's equipment in the Finals (...) looked a little suspect" and an unidentified member of the Ottawa Senators said "he looked huge out there".[1]

On June 21, 2007 the club announced that the team had agreed to a multi-year contract with Giguere, keeping their Cup-winning starting goalie. Giguere posted a 35-17-6 record with a 2.12 goals against average in the 2007-2008 season. Despite his numbers, the defending champion Ducks were defeated in the first round of the 2008 playoffs by the Dallas Stars in six games.

[edit] Transactions

[edit] Awards

Preceded by
Nicklas Lidström		 Conn Smythe Trophy Winner
2003		 Succeeded by
Brad Richards

[edit] Career statistics

[edit] Regular season

   
Season Team League GP W L T MIN GA SO GAA SV%
1992-93 Laval QAAA 25 12 11 2 1498 76 0 3.04 n/a
1993-94 Verdun Collège Français QMJHL 25 13 5 2 1234 66 0 3.21 n/a
1994-95 Halifax Mooseheads QMJHL 47 14 27 5 2755 181 2 3.94 n/a
1995-96 Halifax Mooseheads QMJHL 55 26 23 2 3230 185 1 3.44 n/a
1996-97 Halifax Mooseheads QMJHL 50 28 19 3 3009 169 2 3.37 .902
1996-97 Hartford Whalers NHL 8 1 4 0 394 24 0 3.65 .881
1997-98 Saint John Flames AHL 31 16 10 3 1758 72 2 2.46 .926
1998-99 Calgary Flames NHL 15 6 7 1 860 46 0 3.21 .897
1998-99 Saint John Flames AHL 39 18 16 3 2145 123 3 3.44 .905
1999-00 Saint John Flames AHL 41 17 17 3 2243 114 0 3.05 .897
1999-00 Calgary Flames NHL 7 1 3 1 330 15 0 2.73 .914
2000-01 Cincinnati Mighty Ducks AHL 23 12 7 2 1306 53 0 2.43 .917
2000-01 Mighty Ducks of Anaheim NHL 34 11 17 5 2031 87 4 2.57 .911
2001-02 Mighty Ducks of Anaheim NHL 53 20 25 6 3127 111 4 2.13 .920
2002-03 Mighty Ducks of Anaheim NHL 65 34 22 6 3775 145 8 2.30 .920
2003-04 Mighty Ducks of Anaheim NHL 55 17 31 6 3210 140 3 2.62 .914
2004-05 Hamburg Freezers DEL 6 n/a n/a n/a 302 12 0 2.38 .925
2005-06 Mighty Ducks of Anaheim NHL 60 30 15 0 3381 150 2 2.66 .911
2006-07 Anaheim Ducks NHL 56 36 10 0 3244 122 4 2.26 .918
2007-08 Anaheim Ducks NHL 58 35 17 0 3310 117 4 2.12 .922
NHL REG. SEASON TOTALS 411 191 151 25 23,664 957 29 2.43 .915
AHL REG. SEASON TOTALS 134 63 50 11 7452 362 5 2.70 n/a
QMJHL REG. SEASON TOTALS 177 81 74 12 10228 601 5 3.39 n/a

[edit] Trivia

Giguere suffers from a rare gastric condition that causes his body to take in too much air when he drinks fluids. As a result, his body has difficulty absorbing water, with all the sweating he does during a game, thus leading to severe dehydration.[2] This became the case when he was in the AHL during the 1997-98 season. During one game, he lost 19 pounds, became sick, and was rushed to the hospital.[3] Team doctors in Calgary then discovered the condition that caused him to lose weight. Since then, he began drinking water from his bottle with a straw to reduce air intake. He is the only NHL goalie to drink water from his bottle using a straw.

[edit] Notes and references

  1. ^ Muir, Allan. "Breaking the rules: NHL", Sports Illustrated, 2007-07-25. Retrieved on 2007-07-26. 
  2. ^ Stanley Cup Winner JS Giguere Tackles Hydration Issue with Sweat Test. gatorade.ca (2007). Retrieved on 2007-08-21.
  3. ^ hockeygoalies bio

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

v • d • e
New England Whalers/Hartford Whalers/Carolina Hurricanes first-round draft picks
Whalers (WHA): Goldup • Dunlop • T. Young • McDonald
Whalers (NHL): Allison • Arthur • Francis • Lawless • Turgeon • Cote • Murzyn • S. Young • Hull • Govedaris • Holik • Grieg • Poulin • Petrovicky • Pronger • O'Neill • Giguere
Hurricanes: Tselios • Heerema • Tanabe • Knyazev • Ward • Staal • Ladd • Johnson • Sutter