The QMJHL Arena Guide - Iberville Palladium, St-Jean Castors

Iberville is the town on the eastern banks of the Richelieu River across from St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, and is best known internationally for being the home of the famous racing Villeneuves, Gilles and Jacques. It is certainly not known for its history in the QMJHL, which in actuality only extends to one game, a 5-3 Shawinigan victory over the Castors on February 12, 1984. That year, a municipal strike had shuttered the Colisée Isabelle-Brasseur, and so the St-Jean Castors played one game across the river in the tiny Palladium. (When I went looking in an old issue of the Journal de Montreal for information about this game, that day's major headline was ANDROPOV EST MORT.)

The Iberville Palladium is now known as the Aréna Marcel-Larocque, and it sits in a residential neighbourhood in Iberville. It is a community rink covered in brown brick and aluminum siding. Inside, there's a pretty typical arena lobby that leads both to the secondary ice pad and out into the main arena bowl. The Palladium is small, with a low ceiling and a few rows of grey-painted bench seating running from goal line to goal line. In fact, every surface is painted battleship grey, which leads to the feeling of dreariness inside - a little colour would go a long way. It's essentially a junior B rink; and while I haven't been able to find capacity figures, I'd guess it holds less than a thousand people.

The Palladium is a footnote in QMJHL history, and the league will never return, even in similarly extenuating circumstances. Even if St-Jean was to get a team back, another strike would shut the doors of every arena in the area, as municipal reorganization in Quebec has meant that Iberville no longer exists as an independent community.