Calgary Flames where are they now: #7 Stephane Yelle

The season starts in a week! Let’s play “Where are they now?” with a former Calgary Flames player who wore the number seven, Stephane Yelle.

There is only a week until the season starts! Where has the time gone? The Calgary Flames will open their season up on the road against one of their division rivals, the Vancouver Canucks. With just seven days left until the season starts, let’s play an edition of “Where are they now?” with #7 Stephane Yelle.

Yelle spent five seasons with the Flames from 2002 until 2008 where the centerman put up 31 goals and 96 points in 339 games. So, where did he go when he left Calgary?

Since leaving in 2008, Yelle signed a one-year contract with the Boston Bruins as a free agent just prior to the start of their training camp. The Bruins led the Eastern Conference that year with 116 points and were one point shy of the President’s Trophy. They unfortunately lost to the Carolina Hurricanes in Game 7 of the second round of the playoffs.

The following season, Yelle signed a one-year contract with the team who beat them in the playoffs — the Canes. The 35-year old defensive forward was struggling and the Canes put him on waivers a mere few weeks after the season started on October 26. Going unclaimed, the Canes kept him on the roster until trade deadline that season, where he was promptly traded to the team which he started his NHL career with, the Colorado Avalanche.

Putting up just one point in 11 games with the Avs to end the season, he decided it was time to hang up his skates. He decided to stay in Colorado for the next few years. Yelle was a development coordinator the season following his retirement with the Avs for 2010-11 season. The following two years, he stayed in Colorado and took an assistant coaching position with Valor Christian High. Since then, Yelle has started his own business by being a fitness instructor and a part-owner of a start-up cycling and yoga business.

In 2015, Yelle along with 14 other Avalanche Alumni were honoured before a game in December to celebrate the Avs’ 20-year anniversary. Yelle won two cups with the Avs – one in his rookie year in 1996 and the other in 2001.

Via Denver Post:

"“I love to come back and see the guys, and we had a charity game a couple months ago in Aspen,” Yelle said. “I heard (the Red Wings are training), so we got to get together and get it going.”"

Stephane Yelle should  have a third Stanley Cup in ’04 with the Calgary Flames, but I digress.