Hockey Award Recipients

In memory of Matthew, the Board of the St. John's Minor Hockey Association approached us to ask how they could best honor our son.  First and foremost, I requested that we retire his #7 jersey to the rafters right above home bench in Twin Rinks No. 1 - this was his favorite ice surface as well as bench.  The jersey was retired in a private ceremony in the early Fall of 2005. In my eyes, there was no better tribute to Matthew than this with respect to his minor hockey career.

In addition to retiring the jersey, all midget players had Matthew's pink & purple memorial ribbon sewn to their jerseys as did some of the officials and coaches who also knew Matthew.

The other thing that we decided upon was to create an award to honor a player or players in the midget division that exhibited the same character as Matt's.  To this end, the St. John's Minor Hockey Association created "The Matthew Churchill Memorial Award".

Lawlor's Trophy & Engraving of St. John's created the award for the SJMHA and Paul Lawlor did the etching of Matthew's likeness.  The dedication below Matthew's image states:

"This award is in memory of midget player MATTHEW CHURCHILL who was tragically killed on March 28, 2005".

The award description was written by me and Desma to describe the selection criteria and is included on the trophy on the large blue panel.

The very first presentation was made in April of 2006 prior to the gold medal midget house game.  We decided that one player from each team be selected to receive the award.  In addition to having their names engraved on the trophy, each awardee received a small plaque commemorating the honor bestowed on them that they could bring home.  Below are pictures of the annual recipients of the player awards.

(Standing; left to right): Matthew Rypien (Red Caps), Alex Walsh (Blue Caps), Rod Churchill (Matt's Dad and Predators coach), Jordan Cross (Burgundy Caps), Tyler Hancock (Orange Caps).

(Kneeling; left to right): Stephen Tulk (Black Caps), Kris Tiller (Altius Predators), Mike Rice (Green Caps), Sarah Tucker (Yellow Caps)

Congratulations to all the recipients especially Alex Walsh and Stephen Tulk who have now finished their minor hockey careers.  It was a real pleasure to know you guys for the last number of years and your friendship and sense of fun will always be remembered.  Best of luck Awol and Tulkie.

The 2007-2008 awards were particularly special to me this year since the players who were third year Midget's this season would have been the last players to have either played with or against Matthew while he was playing hockey.  This includes good friends Greg Thorne and Jason Duggan who now finish their minor hockey careers.