An evening of celebration and wishes of good luck took place this weekend during the Drumheller Dragons annual end of season awards banquet.
Parents, billets, fans, staff members, and volunteers came together to celebrate the 2014/2015 Dragons season coming to an end on Saturday evening, and to wish good luck to the six players who are 20-years-old and will be moving on to other endeavours.
The evening began with thank you’s from coaching staff to all those who made the 2014/2015 season a success.
The first award given out was for the volunteer of the year.
This year’s recipient was Susan Doyle who has volunteered for many years with the Dragons doing 50/50 at the games.
The Chinook Financial Fan Favourite, presented by Junior Dragons fan Averie Thompson, was given to goaltender Curtis Skip.
The Hardest Working Dragon for the 2014/2015 season was Carter Czaikowski and Tristan Thompson received the award for Rookie of the Year.
Dakota Zaharichuk, one of six players who is 20-years-old and will be moving on from the Junior ‘A’ organization, received the award for top scorer during the season with 21 goals and 33 assists for a total of 54 points.
The award for Academic Achievement was received by Craig Ofner and the Most Improved Player award went to Connor Duncan.
Jim and Kari-Ann Faubion presented the Faubion Family Unsung Hero award to Jacob Schofield.
Ryan Suchorab received three awards on Saturday evening, Top Defenseman, Most Valuable Player, and the Jeff Hendricks Memorial Award which was presented by Marty Weymark.
Suchorab said it was great to see everyone get recognized, especially the volunteers and fans.
Scott Ivey had many experiences in the community this past season and received the award for Community Involvement.
The award for playoff performer went to Hunter Mills. Those in attendance were proud to hear Mills’ name when the award was presented after the controversy when the power failure occurred during the final game in the Camrose playoff series.
Mills recalls the events in Camrose that night by saying, “I saw Tristan Thompson had the puck at the point, so I wanted to get in front of the net, had a good play, shot it off the boards and it went wide, there was a scramble for it, it ended up on my stick, right in front of the net, and I shot it, put it on the pads, put it on net and then I saw it go in. I saw it hit the mesh, I threw my hands in the air and then it just went black, I was just celebrating by myself. I just kind of looked around and saw everyone’s phones and some lights in the stands and I didn’t really know what was going on so I thought we had to celebrate in the dark, but it turns out that they didn’t count it. The ref said, it’s playoffs and you can’t count that which is understandable, everything happens for a reason.”
Mills’ said receiving the award Saturday night was a huge honour. “I honestly thought it could have gone to five guys on this team if not more. It was awesome playing with these guys.”
As the staff, fans and volunteers wish good luck to Skip, Mills, Zaharichuk, Suchorab, Mitchell Cook and Marcus Messier, they will now prepare to welcome new Dragons to the team for the 2015/2016 season with spring training camp which will take place this weekend at Memorial Arena.
