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Tickets selling quickly for Moose Jaw and District Sports Hall of Fame banquet

Special event in Moose Jaw Events Centre curling rink to feature induction ceremonies for classes from 2020, 2021 and 2022

The Moose Jaw and District Sports Hall of Fame is only a couple of weeks away from hosting the largest induction ceremony in the organization’s history, with a total of 13 newcomers to be enshrined over three years of classes.

And as one might expect, tickets are moving quickly for the special event.

MJDSHF president Larry Graham estimated that 100 tickets have already been sold for the ceremony on Saturday, Oct. 1, with the event taking place in the Moose Jaw Events Centre curling rink this time around due to the expected large number of attendees.

“With so many inductees, we’re pretty sure we’re going to outgrow the previous room (on the Events Centre mezzanine) so we figured that would be the best move,” Graham said. “And there will be a little bit of a different format, but it’ll be mostly the same with the piping in of the inductees, each of them giving a speech and receiving plaques. So things are shaping up and it’s going to be another fun night.”

Seeing as the previous two induction ceremonies were postponed due the pandemic, the decision was made to roll classes from 2020, 2021 and 2022 into one large ceremony. The 2020 group is the largest of the bunch, featuring volleyball athlete Darcy Busse, hockey/baseball builder John Hunter, baseball builder Charlie Meacher, wrestling builder Dave Pyle, basketball athlete Marg (Curry) Sihvon and hockey athlete Ed Staniowski. The 2021 class will see wrestling athlete/builder Frank Abdou, golf athlete Lorie Boyle, the 1992 Amber Holland curling team and football athlete Levi Steinhauer enshrined and the 2022 group includes track and field and bobsleigh athlete John Graham, high school coach and baseball standout Ned Andreoni and longtime local umpire Rocky Nickel.

Those attending the event can expect all sorts of fun stories and tales given the wide range of sports and individuals involved -- and once you add in all the interesting connections between the inductees, things get even more interesting.

Take John Hunter as an example -- while going through photos with Graham for the ceremony, there were all sorts of nifty little tidbits to be found.

“There are so many connections that I didn’t know about,” Graham said with a tone of amazement. “Going through some photos of John, there are photos of Ed Staniowski in there, of Clark Gillies, of Ned Andreoni in there. Then I was talking to Ed Staniowski, and he said he was looking forward to it because John Hunter was someone who coached him. 

Then Rocky Nickel, John coached him and he and John coached together for a few years. So it’s a really neat thing… there are so many connections you find out about and it’s really interesting.”

Then there’s just the opportunity for folks to get together again -- the ceremony will be the first since 2019 for the Hall of Fame, and everyone is looking forward to having a chance to reconnect.

“It’s our first event in the post-COVID era, so it’s going to be nice to see a lot of familiar faces we haven’t seen for a long time,” Graham said. 

Tickets are $60 each through sasktix.ca and can be found by scrolling down the site to the upcoming events section. Things kick off at 5:30 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 1.

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