Julien Vauclair (born October 2, 1979) is a

Swiss Swiss most commonly refers to: * the adjectival form of Switzerland * Swiss people Swiss may also refer to: Places * Swiss, Missouri * Swiss, North Carolina * Swiss, West Virginia * Swiss, Wisconsin Other uses * Swiss Café, an old café located ...

former professional

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey in North America) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an Ice rink, ice skating rink with Ice hockey rink, lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. Tw ...

defenseman Defence or defense (in American English) in ice hockey is a player position that is primarily responsible for preventing the opposing team from Goal (ice hockey), scoring. They are often referred to as defencemen, D, D-men or blueliners (the l ...

who spent most of his career with

HC Lugano Hockey Club Lugano, often abbreviated to HC Lugano or HCL, is a professional ice hockey club based in Lugano, Switzerland. The team competes in the National League (NL) and has won seven Swiss championships. History The founding of HC Lugano took ...

in the

National League National League often refers to: *National League (baseball), one of the two baseball leagues constituting Major League Baseball in the United States and Canada *National League (division), the fifth division of the English football (soccer) system ...

(NL). He made his professional debut in 1996 with

HC Ajoie HC Ajoie is a Swiss professional ice hockey team that competes in the National League (NL), the highest league in Switzerland. The team was founded in 1973 and plays in the Raiffeisen Arena in Porrentruy, Switzerland. HC Ajoie has won three Swis ...

in Switzerland's second tier,

Swiss League The Swiss League, also known as the Sky Swiss League for sponsorship reasons, is the second tier of the main professional ice hockey league in Switzerland, behind the National League (ice hockey), National League. The winners of the league each ...

(SL). He spent three seasons within the

Ottawa Senators The Ottawa Senators (), officially the Ottawa Senators Hockey Club and colloquially known as the Sens, are a professional ice hockey team based in Ottawa. The Senators compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Atlantic Di ...

organization of the

National Hockey League The National Hockey League (NHL; , ''LNH'') is a professional ice hockey league in North America composed of 32 teams25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. The NHL is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Cana ...

(NHL). The Senators selected him 74th overall in the 1998 NHL Entry Draft.

Playing career

As a youth, Vauclair played in the 1992 and 1993

Quebec International Pee-Wee Hockey Tournament The Quebec International Pee-Wee Hockey Tournament () is an annual minor ice hockey event in Quebec City. The tournament was founded in 1960 to coincide with the Quebec Winter Carnival, and give an opportunity for international competition to p ...

s with a team from Switzerland. Vauclair was drafted 74th overall by the

of the

(NHL) in the 1998 NHL Entry Draft and played one NHL game for the Senators in the

2003–04 NHL season The 2003–04 NHL season was the 87th regular season of the National Hockey League. The Stanley Cup champions were the Tampa Bay Lightning, who won the best of seven series four games to three against the Calgary Flames. For the fourth time in ...

. Vauclair has also played in the

American Hockey League The American Hockey League (AHL) is a professional ice hockey league in North America that serves as the primary developmental league of the National Hockey League (NHL). The league comprises 32 teams, with 26 in the United States and 6 in Cana ...

with the

Grand Rapids Griffins The Grand Rapids Griffins are a professional ice hockey team based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. They compete in the American Hockey League (AHL), playing their home games at Van Andel Arena. They are the AHL affiliate to the Detroit Red Wings of t ...

and the

Binghamton Senators The Binghamton Senators were a professional ice hockey team in the American Hockey League (AHL) that played from 2002 to 2017. Nicknamed the B-Sens, they played in Binghamton, New York, at the Floyd L. Maines Veterans Memorial Arena. The B-Sens w ...

. Vauclair began his professional career with Lugano in 1998, and he returned to them in 2004 and has played for them since. On June 2, 2019, Vauclair agreed to a one-year contract extension with HC Lugano, stating that this would be his final season of professional hockey. On March 26, 2020, Vauclair officially announced his retirement from professional hockey. Vauclair played all of his 791 regular season games (273 points) in the National League with HC Lugano, as well as 154 playoffs games (34 points). He won 2 NL titles with the team and was named twice to the NL Media Swiss All-Star Team. In addition to that, his jersey with the number 3 was to be retired by HC Lugano in the

2020–21 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen ...

season, however with the interruption of the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

, his jersey was later retired in a game against

on 16 September 2022.

International play

Vauclair has played internationally for Switzerland in three Olympics and nine World Championships, winning a silver medal in the 2013 World Championships. On January 6, 2014, Vauclair was named to Team Switzerland's official

2014 Winter Olympics The 2014 Winter Olympics, officially called the XXII Olympic Winter Games () and commonly known as Sochi 2014 (), were an international winter multi-sport event that was held from 7 to 23 February 2014 in Sochi, Russia. Opening ro ...

roster.

Career statistics

Regular season and playoffs

International

Awards

2004 2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and Its Abolition (by UNESCO). Events January * January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight 60 ...

AHL All-Star Game *

2013 2013 was the first year since 1987 to contain four unique digits (a span of 26 years). 2013 was designated as: *International Year of Water Cooperation *International Year of Quinoa Events January * January 5 – 2013 Craig, Alask ...

World Championships All-Star Team

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Vauclair, Julien 1979 births Living people HC Ajoie players Binghamton Senators players Grand Rapids Griffins players Ice hockey players at the 2002 Winter Olympics Ice hockey players at the 2006 Winter Olympics HC Lugano players Olympic ice hockey players for Switzerland Ottawa Senators draft picks Ottawa Senators players People from Delémont Swiss-French people Swiss ice hockey defencemen Ice hockey players at the 2014 Winter Olympics Sportspeople from the canton of Jura