Women’s junior league celebrates 20 years

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This article was published 19/02/2025 (591 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Manitoba Junior Women’s Hockey League (MJWHL) celebrated its 20th anniversary on Feb. 7-9 at the Hockey for All Centre. Seven teams comprised of league alumni, plus a team of league rookies, competed in a tournament that concluded on the Sunday. The teams were divided into two groups of four, and played a round-robin within their groups.

More than 100 former players returned for the tournament with some coming from Alberta, British Columbia and the United States. League president Ashton Liskie called the final between the Manitoba Blizzard and the Polar Ice “a winter storm.”” The Blizzard topped the Ice 4-1, with Jocelyn Seren scoring twice and Dana Poulton and Stefanie Leslie adding singles. Christine Shepard scored on the stingy Kelsey Bowerman in the Blizzard net. In the semi-finals, the Blizzard beat Prairie Blaze and the Ice eliminated the Northern Stars.

The history of the MJWHL can been traced back to Oct. 21, 2004, when the formation of the league was announced at the Winnipeg Winter Club. Randy Dalton and Kirk Kuppers, were key to the formation of the league. The goal was to create a female junior aged (U21) competitive and developmental hockey league in the province for graduates of the midget and high school programs. Kuppers served as tleague president from 2004 until 2019.

The South East Ice, Winnipeg Rage, Western Predators, Manitoba Blizzard and the Northern Stars were the five original teams. Seven teams are playing in the 2024-25 season with each team also playing a home game against the Thunder Bay U22 Queens that counts in the standings.

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Kirk Kuppers certainly qualifiesm and so does Don Kuryk, the past-president of the Manitoba Hockey Hall of Fame. The Canadian Ukrainian Athletic Club (CUAC) and Sinclair Park Community Centre (SPCC) are celebrating a 100th anniversary this year and the pair are co-chairing the committee planning a Legacy 100 event on Sept. 19 at the North End community centre. The other committee members are Bob Ashuk, Joan (Solohub) Atamanchuk, Bev (McMillan) Harbour, and Bud Ulrich.

CUAC was formed in the fall of 1925 as an athletic club to support sports for Ukrainian youth. However, the activities of the club, whose motto was “sound of body, sound of mind” were not limited to young Ukrainians. CUAC will go down in our province’s history as one of our most important sports organizations.

A juvenile boys baseball team was the first team to represent CUAC. By 1928, the club also had teams in the junior and intermediate leagues. What is believed to be a first for organized sports for girls among Ukrainian Canadian sports clubs in Canada happened in 1932 when CUAC entered a softball team in the city girls intermediate league. CUAC Blues senior girls team became our province’s most successful softball team from the mid-1950s to early 1970s and won two Western Canada titles and the first Canadian senior women’s championship in 1965.

On the hockey ice, CUAC won Manitoba bantam, midget and juvenile championships. Future NHLers Nick Mickoski and Cal Gardner played for the CUAC juniors. Through the years, CUAC teams also competed in basketball, football, lacrosse and soccer and the club ran mixed curling and five-pin bowling leagues.

In 1972, CUAC as an entity ended when a City of Winnipeg parks and recreation recommended a centralized operation of recreation facilities. The city changed the name to Sinclair Park Community Centre. The loss of facilities led to CUAC terminating its minor baseball and hockey programs.

The planning committee is looking for photographs and memorabilia related to both CUAC and Sinclair Park. Information on the Legacy 100 celebration and how former CUAC and Sinclair Park participants can become involved be found online at cuac@andrichmedia.ca