With the incredible number of nominations the Moose Jaw and District Sports Hall of Fame has received over the years, the selection committee’s job gets a bit more difficult each time around.
When there are so many worthy individuals involved in the sports community as athletes and builders over the decades and decades of games played in Moose Jaw, that’s only to be expected.
And as a result, the organization will see one of its largest single-year classes enshrined on the Wall of Fame on the Moose Jaw Events Centre second floor mezzanine in 2023, as a total of eight individuals will be honoured.
“There were lots of nominations and people are still interested so we thought we’d induct a few more this year,” said Moose Jaw and District Sports Hall of Fame president Larry Graham. “It’s good that we’re getting a lot of nominations, the tough part is deciding who to induct every year.”
The 2023 class includes wrestler John Bozak, powerlifter Wayne Cormier, volleyball, baseball and fastball builder Brad Hennenfent, rugby athlete and builder David Jukes, hockey athlete and builder Jim Little, baseball and curling builder Stan Montgomery, fastball and hockey player Gary Ross and hockey player Ivan Theodore ‘Amos’ Wilson.
It’s a class that covers the gamut of sports and years of activity, and a group that was anything but easy to get down to given the ever-increasing number of potential inductees.
“Our selection committee has a two-ring binder filled with nominations, about twice as many as we’ve inducted, and they’re all pretty worthy in their own right,” Graham said.
The selection committee -- comprised of four members of the public and four members of the board -- goes through the nominations and ranks each individual, after which the results are compiled and the board makes the final decision.
“Every one of them says it’s tough,” Graham said of the committee’s selections. “Especially comparing people from different eras and different sports, or sports that the individual maybe isn’t familiar with. So it’s a big job and we really appreciate these folks, they always do a great job.
A formal press conference where the 2023 inductees will have their plaques unveiled on the Wall of Fame will take place on Thursday, Sept. 7 at 10:30 a.m.
The official induction ceremony will be held on Friday, Oct. 27 at the Moose Jaw Event Centre. For more information and / or tickets, contact the Hall of Fame at [email protected].
