The time when Lapierre thought he had to confront Laraque

An attempted “settlement” between Brendan Gallagher and Jean-Gabriel Pageau, during Thursday night's game between the Canadiens and Islanders, brought back certain memories for Maxime Lapierre.

The former Habs provocateur once found himself in a similar situation to Gallagher, who essentially had to deal with retaliation from the Islanders after the questionable hit he took against Adam Pelech last January.

In fact, this happened to him more than once during his career.

“It's exhausting, not even close,” he admitted Friday during an appearance on “JiC.”

“You know the whole arena is waiting for that, to eat honest food, and that's not a nice feeling,” he added.

Lapierre first remembered the time when He hit San Jose Sharks defenseman Dan Boyle hardin 2013. Poor Boyle left the ice on a stretcher, then LaPierre was suspended, and when his then-team, the St. Louis Blues, played again in San Jose, there was a lot of tension in the air.

“I knew that after I came back from a five-game suspension, we were playing against San Jose and that things were probably going to be tough,” he said.

He continued: “The match started and on the other side, there were three or four strong men on the ice.” I was nervous and inside I was saying to myself “Okay, this is definitely going to happen, I don't know at what level I'm going to take a trip because the four, the other side, is harder, but it's all in different stages.”

Finally, the player in front of him in the initial confrontation, Andrew Desjardins, informed him that nothing would happen, at the request of the Sharks coach.

“I took a deep breath and started playing,” LaPierre laughed.

The message from “George the Great”

Yes, Lapierre broke out in a cold sweat that day, but he had already had a worse scare a few years ago, when he wore Montreal Canadiens colors and found himself having to answer for his actions. After “Give Six Inches” by Sidney Crosby During a play.

When the Habs faced the Pittsburgh Penguins again, there was a big-time prospect tasked with making him regret his action: Georges Laraque.

“He (Larac) said to Francis Bouillon, in the warm-up, 'I'm sorry, but I have to fight with Max,'” Lapierre said. Francis himself was nervous when he told me this.

Then he said: “I thought: 'Oh no, that's not right, it will happen against George, I have no chance.'

“If there's one person you don't want to mess with, it's George.”

Ultimately, this confrontation did not happen. Lapierre miraculously survived, but this simple warning from Big George was enough to give him a very bad time.

“Things didn't go well at Gatorade,” he summed up.

Watch his full intervention on “JiC” in the main video.

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