Francois St. Laurent

The Greenfield Park, QC native grew up in the suburbs of Montreal. He started skating at 3 years old and fell in love with the big leather pads in his first year of playing the game. 

St.Laurent goaltending’s career had him reaching the Junior levels before he hung up his pads. During his playing time, he also started at age 12 working at the local rink as a timekeeper for youth hockey games making some extra money and because he loved to be around the rink. 

When he reached the age of 15, one of the local influent referee asked him if he ever considered becoming an on-ice official rather than working the clock due to his high playing level experience at the time and also due to his knowledge and passion for the game. He signed up for the next officiating clinic and became an on-ice official in the fall of 1992. 

His game management and rapport with the different hockey participants got him moving up the level of officiating at a furious pace. St.Laurent was named the “Top Prospect” official of the Province of Quebec in the spring of 1997. He reached the QHJML and the AHL in the summer of 1999 as a linesman while still working the lower provincial leagues as a referee. 

The following year he was promoted in the QHJML as a referee and continued working the lines in the AHL. In his second year as a referee in the QHJML, he was selected to work the prestigious Memorial Cup Tournament in Guelph, Ontario. This was the first year that the Canadian Hockey League (CHL) was selecting one referee from each of its three junior leagues to work the spring competition, unofficially naming him the best referee from the QHJML that year. He went on to work the last two games of the tournament (Semi-Final and Championship Game) back when the game was still using the one referee system. 

He worked another full season in the QHJML the following year while still working the lines in the AHL before he was offered in the summer of 2003 a minor league referee contract from the National Hockey League. He went on to work six years has a minor league member, working the 2009 AHL All-Star Game in Worcester, MA and working the 2008 & 2009 AHL Calder Cup Finals. 

He was promoted to a full time NHL referee status in the summer of 2009