Thats interesting. Unaware of it, somewhat surprised C58..... First introduced in 1937/38 (radio obviously) the "3 Stars" or "Trois Etoiles" was sponsored by Imperial Oil (Esso) as a marketing gimmick/ploy to promote their "3 Star Gasoline", a sponsorship that ran until 76 if I'm not mistaken... then taken over by Molson's in Toronto & Montreal, Vancouver & the rest of the Canadian markets..... At seasons end, the players with the most accumulated 3 Star Selections awarded Cups, financial reward matched with a charitable donation.
Branada Sports Group, a company I was involved with (Bill Watters, Rick Curran, Bobby Orr, player agency) actually had the contract administering the program for Molsons through the 80's which was fairly extensive with an employee assigned to the collation & administration duties thereof full-time. If the french broadcasters in conjunction with their english counterparts didnt select or collectively agree upon the 3 Star Selections, working independently then this would have caused problems for the program, for Imperial Oil & Molsons UNLESS.... the french broadcasts 3 Star Selections & program bundled separately, sold to different sponsors? Thats entirely possible, in fact quite probable, interesting twist, little known piece of trivia.