Staff
Staff
The calendar year for local athletics always is a vast landscape full of triumphs and tragedies.
Those two extremes were defined even more emphatically throughout 2015 as tears of joy for sporting success were mixed with tears of sadness for lost games or, more importantly, people.
A hero came home for a visit while another two left this world—but not our hearts—for good.
Championships and historic performances seemingly came by the truckload while near-misses, both expected and otherwise, peppered the roll call of achievements.
It was a canvas upon which was painted an indelible story unlike any other before it or the ones that will follow.
Here is a look back at some of the memorable moments of the year that was in sports here in Rainy River District:
January
•Long-time stock car driver and go-kart racing volunteer Charles “Chuck” Lambert, 46, of Alberton Township died when the snowmachine he was driving collided with a dock structure along the shoreline of Lake Despair.
•Chris Silver skipped his Fort Frances team of third Reece Jones, second Kurt McGuire, and lead Mathew Nowak to fifth place at the Northern Ontario junior curling championships in Sault Ste. Marie.
•The Fort Frances Sports Hall of Fame announced its first set of inductees, including hockey player Frank “Ike” Eizenzopf and bodybuilder Brock Madill (athletes category), executive Jon Gustafson (builders’ category), and the 1960 Fort Frances Canadians and the 1989 Muskie football team (team category).
Also joining them are the 10 Fort Frances natives and the 1952 Allan Cup champion Fort Frances Canadians already inducted into the Northwestern Ontario Sports Hall of Fame in Thunder Bay.
•Playing second for skip Tracy Horgan of Sudbury, Devlin native Jenna Enge helped the rink win the inaugural Northern Ontario women’s provincial curling championship in Thunder Bay, beating Fort William’s Kendra Lilly (with Fort resident Tirzah Keffer at lead) 4-3 in the final.
•Five Fort Frances bowlers qualified for the Northern Ontario Open championships in Sudbury after earning spots through the zone qualifier at Plaza Lanes.
•Fort Frances Aquanaut Adam Stromberg (eight golds) and Abby Bone of the Cyclone Swim Club (five golds) led their respective teams at the Northwestern Ontario regional championships in Thunder Bay.
•Couchiching residents Amber Jourdain and Alexis Perreault made the final roster for Team Ontario’s women’s hockey team that will compete in the National Aboriginal Hockey Championships in Halifax, N.S.
February
•The Muskies swept the NorWOSSA curling finals in Sioux Lookout, with Hailey Beaudry (girls), Reece Jones (boys), and Anika Beaudry (mixed) skipping their respective rinks to gold.
Beaudry and Silver went on to claim silver at the NWOSSAA playdowns in Sioux Lookout but failed to advance to OFSAA.
•Kathie Jackson skipped the Fort Frances quartet of third Teresa McFayden, second Jacquee Loerzel, and lead Leanne Eluik to the Travelers Curling Club Championship Region 1 women’s title in Sioux Lookout, sweeping a best-of-three series against Lori Hoppe (Kenora).
Adam Bolen and his Fort Frances-based team of third Joedy Johnson, second Grant Swire, and lead Johnny Yellowega capture the Region 1 men’s playdowns at the same event.
•Chris Silver skipped his Fort Frances-based foursome of third Myron Armstrong (Stratton), second Daniel Vandenbrand, and lead Davis Jackson to second place at the Bantam boys’ provincial curling championship held here, losing 5-2 to Tanner Horgan (Sudbury) in the final.
•Muskie skiers Arthur Van Ael (silver), Sara Selman, Marin Loncar, and Andrew Roth qualified for OFSAA in Sudbury, where Van Ael finished 122nd, Loncar 140th, and Roth 145th in the senior boys’ five-km freestyle event while Selman ended up 153rd in the junior girls’ three-km freestyle category.
•Erin Tomalty (Nestor Falls) skipped her Fort Frances-based rink of third Anika Beaudry, second Tory Beaudry, and lead Katrina Slomke to a 1-6 record at the Bantam girls’ provincial curling championships in Thessalon.
•The Muskie junior girls’ volleyball team won the lone NorWOSSA winter court sports gold medal for Fort High, sweeping the host Dryden Eagles 3-0 in the final.
However, the Muskie senior girls’ volleyball squad qualified for NWOSSAA despite losing to Dryden 3-2 in the league final (the Eagles already had an OFSAA berth as the host team).
The senior spikers went on to win the NWOSSAA crown by sweeping the Westgate Tigers (Thunder Bay) to qualify for the all-Ontarios for the first time since 2006.
•The Tracy Horgan rink, with Devlin’s Jenna Enge at second, just missed the playoffs at the 2015 Scotties Tournament of Hearts in Moose Jaw, Sask. with a 6-5 record, losing to Team Canada’s Rachel Homan 6-4 in their final round-robin game to be eliminated.
•The Muskie girls’ hockey team defended its NorWOSSA title by sweeping the Dryden Eagles in the best-of-three final, clinching the title with a 5-2 win in Game 2.
•Amber Townson (senior girls’ singles) and the combination team of senior Jonelle Haas, junior Alexis Parker, and Bantam Sarah McDermott both won bronze at the “4 Steps to Stardom” provincial roll-offs in Sudbury.
•Lisa Penner of Fort Frances, playing at the third spot, joined forces with the Kenora-based team of skip Peggy Taylor, second Colleen Poschner, and lead Tracy Stasiuk to capture the Northern Ontario senior women’s curling championship in Kapuskasing.
March
•The Muskie girls’ hockey team made history with its first-ever medal at the OFSAA ‘A/AA’ championships in Kenora, claiming silver after falling 5-1 in the final to the St. Michael Warriors (Stratford).
The team—and community—were shaken four days later when head coach Scott Clendenning suffered a fatal heart attack while vacationing in Mexico.
About 1,000 people were on hand at the ’52 Canadians Arena for Clendenning’s memorial service.
•The Muskie boys’ hockey team make it to the quarter-finals for the second-straight year at the OFSAA ‘A/AA’ championships in Pembroke/Petawawa before being ousted 3-1 by the Patrick Fogarty Flames (Orillia).
•The Muskie senior girls’ volleyball team ended up 1-3 at the OFSAA ‘AA’ championships in Dryden, losing in the consolation quarter-finals to the L’Amoreaux Saints (Scarborough) by a 3-0 margin.
•The Rainy River Community College Voyageurs, featuring former Muskies Katie Sinclair, Hailey Clendenning, Shilo Beck, and Shelby Tymkin, finished tied for third at the ACHA Division II national women’s hockey championship in York, Pa. after a 1-0 semi-final loss to the West Chester University of Pennsylavania Golden Rams.
•Fort Frances bowler June McNally helped Sunset Country #2 capture first place in its division at the provinical P.O.A. (pins over average) tournament in Timmins to advance to the national roll-offs in Gatineau, Que.
•Fort Frances native Molly Carlson won five medals, including three golds, at the Dive Ontario Spring Provincials in Thunder Bay.
•Lisa Penner and her Northern Ontario team skipped by Peggy Taylor finish 3-3 in pool play and then 2-5 in the championship round to end up fifth at the 2015 Everest Canadian Seniors women’s championship in Edmonton.
•Kathie Jackson’s rink captured the Travelers Curling Club Championship provincial women’s playdowns in Sault Ste. Marie with an 8-3 victory over Jodi Judd (Thunder Bay) in the final.
•The Fort Frances Bantam ‘AA’ Canadians claimed the Northwestern Ontario Bantam ‘AA’ championship on home ice with a 5-1 win over the Lac Seul Blades in the title game.
April
•Muskie Aaron Bujold, only in Grade 9, went 5-0 to finish first in senior boys’ singles at the NorWOSSA badminton playoffs in Sioux Lookout.
Bujold then pocketed the silver medal at the NWOSSAA finals in Thunder Bay to qualify for OFSAA in Markham, where he went 2-4 to make the third round of the consolation side of the ‘C’ flight.
•Former Muskie forward Cole Tymkin was drafted in the fifth round (91st overall) by the London Knights in the 2015 OHL draft.
•Jenna Enge served as second on Thunder Bay-based skip Ron Rosengren’s Northern Ontario rink, which won the 2015 Canadian Postal Curling Employees Classic in Winnipeg, beating Nova Scotia 9-4 in the final.
•Canadian Olympic silver-medalist Kaetlyn Osmond was the special guest performer at the Border Skating Club’s annual ice show.
•The Fort Frances Lakers beat the Thunder Bay North Stars in five games in the semi-final, then downed the Dryden GM Ice Dogs in six games to claim their second-straight SIJHL crown.
•Todd Hamilton was named as the new head coach of the Muskie girls’ hockey team to replace the late Scott Clendenning.
•Former Muskie Cassandra Moffitt signed with the Rainy River Community College Voyageurs to play on its women’s volleyball and basketball teams for the upcoming season.
May
•The Fort Frances Lakers went 2-1 in the round-robin of the Dudley Hewitt Cup Central Canadian Junior ‘A’ hockey tournament at the Ice for Kids Arena, then defeated the OJHL’s Toronto Patriots 6-4 in the semi-final.
But with six regulars out of the lineup due to injury, the Lakers’ bid to reach their first RBC Cup national championship fell short with a 3-2 loss to the Soo Thunderbirds (NOJHL) in the final.
The day after the final, longtime Lakers’ volunteer Bev Kotnik passed away due to illness at age 64.
•Fort Frances natives Davis Ross of the Portage Terriers (MJHL) and Jordan Larson of the Carleton Place Canadians (CCHL) squared off in the RBC Cup final.
Ross scored once as the Terriers prevailed 5-2 to give Portage its first national title since 1973.
•Sixteen members of the Fort Frances Judo Club racked up a combined 19 medals at the season-ending Lake of the Woods Judo Championships in Kenora.
•Fort Frances native Taylor Whitehead claimed the gold medal in the boys’ singles category at the Saskatchewan high school provincial badminton championships in Moose Jaw.
•Fort Frances native Molly Carlson finished fifth in the 3m springboard event at the Diving Canada summer senior national championships in Victoria—her best-ever finish at a national competition.
•The Muskie girls’ soccer team won its second-atraight NorWOSSA title, scoring two goals in the last seven minutes to rally for a 2-1 win over the Dryden Eagles in the final.
The Muskie boys’ team, meanwhile, made it five-straight NorWOSSA crowns with a 5-0 shutout of the Kenora Broncos.
•Muskies Sekina Scheibler, Mitchell Argue, Jenny Hammond, and Jason Bazylewski all posted good enough times or distances to qualify for the OFSAA track-and-field championships after their showings at the NWOSSAA finals in Thunder Bay.
Scheibler had two gold and one silver, Argue had two golds, while Hammond and Bazylewski each nabbed two silvers.
June
•The Muskie boys’ soccer team won two games at the all-Ontarios for the first time in school history to finish with a 2-2 record and in fourth place in Pool ‘A’ at the OFSAA ‘AA’ championships in North Bay.
The Muskie girls’ soccer squad went 0-4 at their OFSAA showdown in Wallaceburg.
•Sekina Scheibler became just the third individual in Muskie history to win gold at OFSAA when he took top spot in the Midget boys’ discus with a top throw of 44.25 metres.
•Bill Godin and Ralph Galusha of Devlin became the first team to repeat in winning their unprecedented fourth title overall at the Emo Walleye Classic with a two-day catch of 13.70 pounds.
•Marie-Mai Langevin of Fort Frances finished seventh in the Super Stocks division at the FirstEnergy All-American Soap Box Derby national qualifier in Valley City, N.D.
Her younger brother, Yannick, posted a 3-2 record in the Stocks division.
•Former Muskie forwards Shelby Tymkin, Katie Sinclair, Shilo Beck, and Hailey Clendenning all were honoured by the American Collegiate Hockey Association.
Tymkin was named a First-Team All-American, Sinclair was chosen as a Second-Team All-American, Beck was picked as a First-Team All-Tournament performer from the ACHA Division II nationals, and Clendenning made the Second-Team All-Tournament squad.
•Fort Frances native Steve Arpin won silver in the rally car final at X Games Austin (Tex.)
•Jenny Hammond was named Muskie female athlete-of-the-year while Connor Bujold earned the male honour.
•Former resident Susan Livingston was recognized posthumously by Racquetball Canada for the person who best exemplified sportsmanship and contributed to the promotion of women in sport at the Canadian national championships in Burnaby, B.C.
Racquetball Canada also announced the award will be renamed in Livingston’s honour.
July
•Barwick fastball legend George Oltsher pitched three innings for the Barwick Blue Knights in his final Rainy River District Fastball League game as he officially retired after a 51-year playing career.
•Fort native Kevin Jackson finished in second place at the Thunder Bay amateur golf championship.
•The Plaza Lanes trio of Betty Robinson, Sylvia Beadle, and Irene Laing, representing Northern Ontario, won silver in the women’s division at the 2015 Club 55+ Triples Team national championships in Winnipeg.
•The Fort Frances duo of Bryan Gustafson and Brian White set a new tournament record with a two-day haul of 34.57 pounds to capture the “Castin’ for Cash” bass tournament hosted by Lake Despair Lodge.
•Fort Frances native Vicki Stinson participated in the 15th World Gymaestrada in Helsinki, Finland as part of Team Canada.
•The team of Davis Wielinga, Shane Wepruk, and Murray Wepruk won the first Safeway Pro-Am fishing tournament in the return of the former “Kid-Pro” event for the first time since 2013.
•Minnesota brothers Steve and Scott Sandberg won their first Fort Frances Canadian Bass Championship title with a three-day total of 52.13 pounds.
•Team Genny Brown nipped Team Kayla Windigo 10-9 in an extra inning in the annual Rainy River District Women’s Fastball League all-star game at Oltsher Field in Barwick.
August
•Former Fort resident and reigning Conn Smythe Trophy winner Duncan Keith of the Chicago Blackhawks brought the Stanley Cup to Fort Frances for “Duncan Keith Day”—marking the first time a player with a Fort Frances background has brought hockey’s “Holy Grail” here.
•Fort native Chris Lindberg was selected for the Northwestern Ontario Sports Hall of Fame in the “Professional Athlete” category after a hockey career that saw the forward play 116 games combined with the Calgary Flames and Quebec Nordiques, as well as help Team Canada win a silver medal at the 1992 Olympic Winter Games in Albertville, France.
•Stratton angler Byron Sharp and his cousin from Winnipeg, Jon O’Connor, joined forces to win the 2015 Kenora Bass International and set a new tournament record by hauling in 57.04 pounds over the three-day event.
•Fort native Alex McDonald won his fifth Kitchen Creek Classic men’s golf championship in six years with a two-day score of 143—finishing five strokes ahead of Dan Baletki.
•The newly-created Fort Frances Sports Hall of Fame inducted its first-ever class of individuals and teams, plus those already inducted into the Northwestern Ontario Sports Hall of Fame.
•Myla Angus scored four times as the La Place Rendez-Vous U18 Voyageurs pounded Taggs 7-2 to capture the Borderland Soccer League women’s division championship.
•The men’s division title went to Manitou Forest Products, who edged the La Place Rendez-Vous U18 Voyageurs 6-5 in a shootout, with Manitou keeper James Pavier netting the game-winning goal moments after stopping Joey Angus in the seventh round of the shootout.
•Fort Frances driver Tylar Wilson had his streak of eight-straight feature wins in the Street Stocks division to start the season snapped by the car co-driven by Delbert Collett and Libby Wilson on the first night of the Rea Memorial Championship at the Emo Speedwau.
Wilson rebounded to win the feature again the following night and finishedthe season with 10 feature win in 11 attemps to earn the division title.
Devlin’s Jeff Davis finished first in the standings in the WISSOTA Modifieds division while Pinewood’s Cody Ossachuk took home the WISSOTA Midwest Modifieds crown.
•The third-ranked Northwest Bay Beavers earned their first Rainy River District Women’s Fastball League title by sweeping the two-time defending champion Red Gut Babes in the best-of-three final—clinching the series with a 21-17 win at home in Game 2.
•The top-ranked Barwick Blue Knights topped the second-ranked Rainy Lake Pirates 8-6 in Game 2 of the Rainy River District Fastball League final, sweeping the beset-of-three series 2-0.
September
•Stratton’s John Gavel’s fourth-place finish in the final race of the Northern Ontario Superior Dirt Riders season in Atikokan was enough to give him the Vet 40-Plus division crown.
•Chip Derickson of Chokoloskee Island, Fla., who summers in Nestor Falls, scored 91 out of 100 to win the Fort Frances Sportsmen’s Club’s annual skeet shooting tournament.
•Fort native Jared Bethune, of the WHL’s Prince George Cougars, played in the 2015 NHL Prospects Tournament in Traverse City, Mich. as a representative of the Minnesota Wild.
•Fort resident Jeff Tilbury placed 107th in the male age 45-49 AG Sprint category at the 2015 International Triathlon Union World Triathlon Grand Final in Chicago.
•The team of Troy Norman (Fort Frances) and Andy Carlson (Emo) came seventh in the 19th-annual “Bassn’ for Bucks” tournament in Sioux Narrows.
•Peter Fuhrer, Joe Brubacher, Jesse Fuhrer, and Brett Gauthier of Devlin won the fifth-annual Triple P Race (running, canoeing, and biking) at Bass Lake Park in Nestor Falls.
• Tricia Bombay and her father, Greg, claimed the Rainy River Walleye Tournament title with a two-day total of 24.06 pounds.
October
•Muskie golfer Tyson Morrisseau finished second in the boys’ division at the NWOSSAA championships at the Heron Landing Golf Course (Couchiching) to qualify for the all-Ontarios—shooting four-over 76 before losing to Cameron Baird of Thunder Bay’s Westgate Tigers on the second extra hole.
The Muskie boys’ golf team also won silver with a combined score of 354—six behind the St. Ignatius Falcons of Thunder Bay (348).
•The Muskie football team ended a six-game losing streak in its annual Homecoming game with a 27-25 come-from-behind triumph over the Daniel McIntyre Maroons.
Fort High completed the regular season with a 2-4 record, then lost 49-20 to the St. Norbert Celtics in the first round of the WHSFL 4th Division playoffs.
•Co-organizer Terry Ogden announced the Fort Frances Sports Hall of Fame only will induct new members every second year instead of on an annual basis.
•Molly Carlson repeated as champion in the Girls ‘A’ 3m springboard event at the Junior Pan American Championship in Varadero, Cuba with a score of 443.70 in the nine-dive final.
•Jordan Larson committed to playing for the NCAA Division I University of Alabama-Hunstville Chargers in the fall of 2016.
•Coach Amy Wilson-Hands led a Fort Frances-based team to the silver medal at the inaugural Northwestern Ontario Aboriginal Volleyball Tournament in Kenora.
•The senior girls’ contingent of the Muskie cross-country running team—featuring Jenny Hammond (captain), Sydney Radigan, Gabi Peters, Tory Beaudry, Kennedi Handberg, and Erin Tomalty—captured the silver medal at the NWOSSAA championships in Thunder Bay.
The Muskies became the first cross-country squad in school history to qualify for the OFSAA championships.
•The Rainy River Community College Voyageurs women’s volleyball team, featuring ex-Muskie Cassandra Moffitt, qualified for the MCAC North Division playoffs for the first time since 2011 before losing in the semi-finals of the Region 13B tournament 3-1 to the Mesabi Range Lady Norse.
November
•Grinding through a difficult course, the Muskie cross-country team is led at the OFSAA championships in Duntroon by captain Jenny Hammond, who took 137th place out of 225 runners in the senior girls’ division while the team itself finished in 38th place overall.
•Local runner Jayne Wyder took part in the TCS New York City Marathon, finishing in a time of 6:02:17.
•Fort native Steve Arpin concluded his first year driving for Chip Ganassi Racing in the Red Bull Global Rallycross circuit in sixth place overall with 357 points.
•All four Muskie court teams went 8-0 during the regular season to finish in first place in NorWOSSA, with three of the four moving on to win gold.
The Muskie senior boys’ volleyball team went on to lose the best-of-three NWOSSAA final 2-0 to the Churchill Trojans (Thunder Bay)—having to forfeit the first match due to the lack of suitable transportation before dropping the second match in four sets.
•Molly Carlson signed a letter of intent to dive for the NCAA Division I Florida State Seminoles starting in the fall of 2016.
•Janie Guimond, who has more international matches to her credit than any other current member of the Canadian women’s volleyball team, conducted a two-day clinic for youth at Fort High.
•Kathie Jackson skipped her Northern Ontario rink of third Teresa McFayden, second Leanne Eluik, and lead Jackie McCormick to fourth place overall at the 2015 Travelers Curling Club Championships in Ottawa, with a preliminary-round record of 5-1 before losing 6-2 in the semi-finals to P.E.I. and then 9-8 in an extra end to Alberta in the bronze-medal game.
•Fort skip Hailey Beaudry and her team of third Nicole Hartlin, second Erin Tomalty, and co-leads Tory and Anika Beaudry took top spot in the Region 1 junior women’s championship at the Fort Frances Curling Club.
Beaudry, along with Ashley Payne’s third-place team of third Chloe Brigham (Atikokan), second Jillian Cousineau, and lead Andrea Schram, both qualified for the provincial junior women’s championship in Sioux Lookout in January.
•The local junior men’s team of skip Chris Silver, third Kurt McGuire, second Taylor Schotroff (Kenora), and lead Davis Jackson missed out on the provincials after losing 2-1 in their best-of-three series against Zach Warkentin (Keewatin).
December
•The Muskie boys’ hockey team was unable to defend its crown at the Victoria Inn High School Hockey Tournament in Brandon, Man., coming away with a fifth-place finish.
•Amber Townson of Fort Frances was the top bowler from the Sunset Country team that took part in the provincial round of the annual Youth Challenge held in Azilda (Sudbury), finishing ninth overall in the ladies’ division with a 205.8 average.
•Fort native Anniss Seid defeated defending champion Bob Shine (Thunder Bay) in the final of the men’s ‘A’ Open division at the Northwestern Ontario Open squash tournament in Thunder Bay after Shine was forced to withdraw due to a hamstring injury.
•The Fort Frances Midget ‘AA’ Canadians hockey team captured its home tournament with a perfect 4-0 record, beating the Assiniboine Park Rangers 3-1 in the gold-medal game.
•Rick Stamarski and Rich Walton from Plaza Lanes teamed up to win the zone “Hi-Low” event in Balmertown to advance to the provincial championships with a five-game total of +226.
Times’ editor Mike Behan also earned a provincial berth after landing in top spot in the “President” division at +43.
•Fort Frances Aquanaut Adam Stromberg claimed silver in the male 15-and-over 100m freestyle at the Prairie Winter Invitational swim meet in Winnipeg.
•Fort native Steve Boileau captured the ‘A’ Open division at the 29th-annual Sunset Country Squash Club Boxing Day tournament here for the first time after beating defending champ Anniss Seid 3-2 in their best-of-five final.
