Throughout the summer and into the fall, we’ll be counting down the days until the Edmonton Oilers begin their 2023-24 season with a daily trip down memory lane. Today at No. 47 we have Marc-Andre Bergeron, an undrafted defenceman who had a successful career but is remembered in Edmonton for one unfortunate play.

Bergeron was selected in the 11th round of the QMJHL draft by the Baie-Comeau Drakkar and broke out a few years later after being traded to the Shawinigan Cataractes.

After being passed over in the 1999 NHL draft, Bergeron scored 74 points in 70 games for the Cataractes during the 1999-00 season. Bergeron followed that up in 2000-01 by scoring 42 goals and 101 points over 69 games, a performance that resulted in him being named the CHL’s Defenceman of the Year.

The Oilers inked Bergeron in the summer of 2001 and he scored 15 points over 50 games with the Hamilton Bulldogs of the AHL in his first professional season. The following year, Bergeron became one of Hamilton’s top offensive defencemen and earned a call-up to the Oilers.

He scored a goal and an assist and logged 16:30 per game in his five-game debut and drew into the lineup during the Oilers’ win-or-go-home Game 6 in the first round of the playoffs with the Dallas Stars. Edmonton lost the game and the series but Bergeron made a name for himself with a huge open-ice hit on Stars winger Brenden Morrow.

Bergeron spent the 2003-04 season between the AHL and NHL but became a full-time player on Edmonton’s blueline after the NHL lockout. His quick passing and big slapshot from the point made Bergeron a really effective player on the team’s power play and he scored 15 goals and 35 points during the regular season in 2005-06.

During the playoffs, Bergeron logged 14:56 per game on Edmonton’s third pairing and scored a couple of goals. In the first game of the Stanley Cup Final against the Carolina Hurricanes, he checked opposing forward Andrew Ladd into goaltender Dwayne Roloson, knocking the Oilers’ goaltender out of the playoffs. The next game, the first shot that backup goaltender Jussi Markkanen faced went off of Bergeron’s skate and over his glove.

Bergeron was removed from the lineup in favour of veteran defenceman Dick Tarnstrom for the remainder of the series and the Oilers wound up losing in seven games. The following season, Bergeron was moved to the New York Islanders in exchange for Denis Grebeshkov and a draft pick.

After leaving Edmonton, Bergeron went on two more deep playoff runs with other teams. He signed as a free agent with the Montreal Canadiens for the 2009-10 season and reached the Eastern Conference Final and did so again the following year while playing with Roloson on the Tampa Bay Lightning.

He played in the NHL until the 2012-13 season before leaving to finish off his career in Switzerland. Bergeron scored 235 points over 490 NHL games in his career before returning to the Shawinigan Cataractes as their Director of Player Development. Most recently, Bergeron worked as the general manager of the Habs’ ECHL affiliate but left the organization this summer.