The Murdoch McKay Clansmen defeated the Kildonan East Reivers 23-6 Thursday to win the first Home Run Sports Vocational Bowl -- a high school football exhbition game -- at East Side Stadium, but both teams came away winners.
The Kraft Dinner Challenge, in which both schools collected boxes of Kraft Dinner, was also won by Murdoch McKay with a total of about 3,400 boxes. Everything collected will be donated to Winnipeg Harvest partners Transcona Food Bank and Gateway Food Bank.
Nate Berens of the Kildonan East Reivers charges in to try to block a field goal attempt by Joshua Breeze of the Murdoch MacKay Clansmen.
"It was something fun to do and a great feeling for all of us to know that we were helping out people in our own communities who need it," said Pedja Hamzic, 16, who played both running back and safety for the Clansmen. The grade 11 player had five interceptions and threw two touchdown passes on trick plays.
"I didn't expect us to get that much, and holy man, I was surprised when they announced the final."
There were about 1,600 people watching the exhibition game.
"Everybody won today, they really did, and kudos to KE, they're a class act over there," said Ron Bresch, Murdoch McKay head coach. "It was a fun game to play in and it was just a blast for all of us involved. We're definitely doing this again next year."
The two schools are both in the River East Transcona School Division and decided to build on that natural rivalry.
Eli Halcrow
"It's nice to be able to show the kids citizenship, collecting for your community and being involved in a sports team," said Kildonan East head coach Lawrence Sangster. "We've got lots of new players on our team and we obviously wanted to win the game but it's an exhibition game and the next game will tell the tale."
Kildonan East has moved into the Currie (A) division so the Reivers and Clansmen will meet in the 2008 WHSFL regular season.
Natives pick up scoring punch
IT'S the first big trade of the off-season for the Manitoba Junior Hockey League, as sniper Eli Halcrow of Thompson was traded to the Neepawa Natives by the Beausejour Blades on Thursday.The deal also gave the MJHL list rights for forward Tyler Bertholet to Neepawa while 20-year-old forwards Karl Kelner, Michael Bunting and Dylan Lawrence went to the Blades.
Halcrow, 19, brings an offensive touch to Neepawa as he led the Blades in scoring with 28 goals and 22 assists for 50 points in 58 games as a rookie.
In other MJHL news, the Winnipeg South Blues announced that Lyle Loewen has been hired as the team's head coach for the 2008-2009 season, replacing Ken Pearson, who moved on to the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League's Battlefords North Stars.
"The passion is still there for me to be involved in the game of hockey and I think it's just a fire within me as far as wanting to give back to the game and the players," said Loewen, who last coached in the MJHL in 2005-2006 with the Selkirk Steelers. He coached his son in peewee and minor bantam the past two years.
Pirnie named Paralympic coach
BRUCE PIRNIE of Winnipeg, a former Olympic thrower, has been named head coach of Canada's 2008 Paralympic Games team by Athletics Canada.
Pirnie, the former head track coach at the University of Manitoba, served as the head coach of Canada's para-athletics team which won 16 medals at the 2007 Parapanamerican Games in Rio de Janeiro.
As an athlete, Pirnie was on the national athletics team member from 1970 to 1979. He was the team captain at the 1972 and 1976 Olympic Games and won a gold medal in the shot put at the 1975 Pan American Games.
Josephson scholarships worth $2,000
IT should to be noted that the Alexander Josephson Memorial Scholarships are, in fact, awards of $2,000 per athlete, not $2,000 in total as was incorrectly stated in this space Thursday.
The scholarships were awarded at a Manitoba High Schools Athletic Association press conference to Katie MacMillan from the Kelvin Clippers and Andrew Brigden of the Souris Valley Vipers. The awards are named in memory of St. John's-Ravenscourt student athlete Alexander Josephson, who died in a car accident in 2005.
Crocker, Kirouac to join ringette hopefuls in camp
Goaltender Elise Crocker and forward Rachelle Kirouac of the Winnipeg Women's High School Hockey League champion St. Mary's Flames head a list of 18 Manitoba ringette players who have been invited to the first Ringette Canada Under-19 Identification Camp.
They will attend the 80-player Team West camp May 16-19 in Regina.
The camp is the first step in selecting athletes to train and prepare for the Junior World Ringette Championship set for Europe in the summer of 2009.
This is an international event which includes teams from developing ringette countries, while ringette powers Canada and Finland will also send their under-19 teams.
Following this camp, Team West will be cut to 35 players with rosters to be finalized in January 2009.
Carter joins Sport Manitoba team
ERIN Carter, former national cycling team member, has joined Sport Manitoba as the communications/public relations officer. She replaces Barry Moroz, who has become Games manager in the Sport Programs Unit.
In her new position, Carter will be helping bring news of Manitoba athletes to the forefront and spreading "unique amateur sports stories in our province and promoting the positive impacts it has on our communities."
Carter, a graduate of Red River College's Creative Communications program, competed for Canada in cycling in three World Championships and at the 2002 Commonwealth Games in Manchester before retiring from elite sport in 2006.
Bisons, Raiders will host mini-Banjo Bowl
THINK "Banjo Bowl" on an amateur scale and give Troy Westwood a round of applause.
The Winnipeg Blue Bombers kicker coined the "Banjo Bowl" term as part of a good-natured insult to Regina and Saskatchewan fans back in 2003 and the name is now golden. Now the fun of that Manitoba-Saskatchewan rivalry is coming to the amateur ranks.
The Vanier Cup champion University of Manitoba Bisons football team is hosting Regina Rams on Aug. 30 in their Canada West Conference 2008 season opener and the game will be preceded by a contest between the Winnipeg High School Football League champion Oak Park Raiders and the Campbell Collegiate Tartans of Regina. Both games will be played at U of M Stadium.
"We're calling it the mini-Banjo Bowl because it's bringing together Manitoba-Saskatchewan rivals at the high school and university level," said Stu Nixon, Oak Park head coach, adding that help with the idea came from Oak Park basketball coach Randy Kusano. "When Brian (Bisons head coach Dobie) and I first talked about it, we said 'this will be fantastic!' Our guys are going to be excited and charged up about playing on the Bisons field. It's just going to be a great experience."
Dobie is just as keen.
"I loved the idea right away! You've got two top Winnipeg teams against two top teams from Regina. It's a natural rivalry and some great football," he said.
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