Moments in sport
From the Rockets and Sun to Evans and Scott, we remember some great moments.
Sports can bring an entire community together. In this week’s Okanagan Top 10, we chose the 10 greatest “moments” over the past 18 years. Rankings were based, in part, on how much an event impacted a community... “I remember where I was when...”
1. 2004 Memorial Cup win on home ice for the Kelowna Rockets
As far as moments go, the celebration that ensued inside and outside of Prospera Place on May 23, 2004, after the host Kelowna Rockets defeated the Gatineau Olympiques 2-1 in the championship game of the Memorial Cup tournament tops this list.
It was an electric atmosphere for the capacity crowd of 6,636 fans, the players, coaches and owner Bruce Hamilton, as well as revelers in the streets and throughout the downtown core. That moment was so memorable that the Rockets are now considering a bid to bring the Memorial Cup back in 2020.
The Rockets also won WHL championships on either side of their Memorial Cup victory, in 2003 and 2005, and have four league titles since 2000, with the most recent in 2009 and 2015.
2. Penticton Vees win 42 games in a row
During a period of almost four months from Nov. 11, 2011 to March 9, 2012, the Penticton Vees established a North American hockey record with 42 consecutive wins en route to a B.C. Hockey League record 110 points (54-4-0-2).
The Vees shattered the old record of 29 straight wins set by the BCHL’s New Westminster Royals in 1989-90. The Vees went on to win the Fred Page Cup, Doyle Cup and the RBC Cup national-Junior A championship, beating Woodstock Slammers 4-3 in the final game in Humboldt, Sask.
The Vees finished the season with a cumulative record of 74-10-2.
During the streak, the Fred Harbinson-coached Vees played under playoff conditions every single night. Each team wanted to be the ones to end “the streak.”
Their 42 wins was a big story, not only in British Columbia, but across the country. The team was featured on TSN.
3. Kelowna’s Kelly Scott, world champion in 2007, Scotties champion in 2006 and 2007
Kelly Scott of Kelowna was on top of the curling world in 2007, crowned the world champion with an 8-4 win over Denmark’s Angelina Jensen in Aomori, Japan, on March 25, 2007.
Now 40 years old, Scott was in her prime at that time, also winning consecutive Scotties Tournament of Hearts titles as Canadian champion in 2006 and 2007. Scott brought home bronze from the 2006 worlds in Grande Prairie, Alta., and represented B.C. at the Scotties eight times since 2000 (2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013) during her dominant run as Kelowna’s most decorated curler.
4. Duncan Keith’s triple crown in 2010
The former Penticton Panthers and Kelowna Rockets junior star has enjoyed a wildly successful pro career, highlighted in 2010 when he won his triple crown of the Stanley Cup with the Chicago Blackhawks, Olympic gold medal with Team Canada in Vancouver and the James Norris Trophy as the NHL’s top defenceman.
Team Canada’s victory, played on home ice in Vancouver, was highlighted by Sidney Crosby’s “Golden Goal.” Team Canada included Shea Weber, a former Kelowna Rocket from Sicamous.
In the Stanley Cup final, the Blackhawks beat Philadelphia Flyers in six games to bring Chicago its first Cup since 1961.
Keith, now 34, also won Olympic gold in 2014, two more Cups with Chicago in 2013 and 2015, taking the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player in the Stanley Cup playoffs in 2015.
In 2017, he was named one of the 100 Greatest Players in NHL history. Keith played the last two years of his minor hockey career in Penticton, two seasons with the then-Penticton Panthers of the BCHL and one season with the WHL’s Kelowna Rockets. He was selected in the 2nd round, 54th overall by Chicago in the 2002 NHL Entry Draft and is still a key member of the team 16 years later.
Keith remains committed to his adopted hometown of Penticton, bringing the Stanley Cup to Gyro Park. His foundation has also been supportive of the Okanagan Similkameen Neurological Society’s Child Development Centre
5. Danny Watkins of West Kelowna selected in first round of NFL draft
Danny Watkins of West Kelowna became a big hit in 2011 when he was selected in the first round of the NFL draft, 23rd overall by the Philadelphia Eagles.
He was the feel-good story of that draft, also becoming the oldest first-round pick since 1971 at age 26.
A likeable 6-foot-3, 310-pound offensive lineman, Watkins was a late-bloomer who played hockey and rugby while attending high school at Mount Boucherie before briefly playing junior football for the Okanagan Sun. Watkins’ passion for firefighting — he had members of the West Kelowna fire department as part of his draft entourage in New York City — overtook his passion for football and he retired from the NFL in 2014 , after stints with Philadelphia and the Miami Dolphins, to become a firefighter in Frisco, Texas, where he had gone to university at Baylor.
6. Big White’s Serwa, Summerland’s Kripps strike Olympic gold
Okanagan athletes were in the spotlight throughout the 2018 Olympics in South Korea, with Kelsey Serwa of Big White winning gold in women’s ski cross and Justin Kripps of Summerland sharing gold in the men’s two-man bobsled.
Serwa, 28, topped the podium in Pyeongchang in front of her grandfather Cliff, who was a co-founder of the Big White Ski Resort outside Kelowna. Serwa had previously won silver at the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi, Russia.
Kripps, 31, was a co-winner following a rare tie with a German team, and also enjoyed success on the World Cup circuit in winning the Crystal Globe award for placing first in both the two-man and the overall standings.
7. Okanagan Sun national champions in 2000
One of the first major sporting moments following the turn of the century saw the Okanagan Sun capture the franchise’s second national championship on their home turf, prevailing 36-28 over the Saskatoon Hilltops in the Canadian Bowl on Nov. 11, 2000, at the Apple Bowl in Kelowna.
The Sun are perennial contenders in the B.C. Football Conference and the Canadian Junior Football League, also advancing to the Canadian Bowl in 2015 but falling 38-24 to the same Hilltops in Saskatoon. The Sun suffered three straight Canadian Bowl defeats to end the 1990s and also lost the 2004 title game to the Edmonton Huskies at Commonwealth Stadium in Edmonton.
8. KSS Owls basketball provincial champions: boys 2016; girls 2018
The Kelowna Owls basketball teams have soared to new heights in recent years, with the boys winning the 2016 provincial title and the girls matching that feat in 2018.
The KSS boys were the first up-country (non-Fraser Valley-Lower Mainland-Vancouver Island) team to win the 4A title since 1980 and were considered one of the best teams in B.C. history, while the KSS girls also captured their first-ever 4A crown.
The boys were led by tournament MVP Grant Shephard, who has since been named the Canada West rookie of the year for the UBC Thunderbirds.
The girls were paced by Taya Hanson, who also won MVP honours at this year’s tournament and is bound for Arizona State University in the fall after becoming the first Kelowna girl to earn an NCAA Division I basketball scholarship.
9. Vernon Vipers legacy of national titles
Each of the three Valley teams in the B.C. Hockey League have achieved national supremacy since 2000, with the Vernon Vipers winning two straight RBC Cups in 2009 and 2010, followed by the Penticton Vees in 2012 and the West Kelowna Warriors in 2016.
The Vipers and Vees are also tied for the most BCHL championships with 12, having each won four since 2000.
The Vipers, under Mark Ferner, won three in a row as a dynasty from 2009 to 2011, while Vees, under Fred Harbinson, have been their biggest rival in winning the 2008 and 2012 Fred Page Cup championships as well as the 2015 and 2017 titles on either side of the Warriors’ lone triumph.
10. Local man wins Ironman Canada
There were a lot of thrilling moments over the 30-year history of Penticton’s Subaru Ironman Canada triathlon, but none greater than 2004.
Tom Evans of Naramata became the first and only local competitor to win the Ironman. In 2004, Evans clocked a time of 8:28:06 to edge out runner-up Gordo Byrn by almost two minutes.
Evans had come so close in 2003 when he logged an 8:37:01 and was second to Raynard Tissink. Evans also had the distinction of twice winning Ironman Florida in 2004 and 2008, and shattering the course record with an 8:07:59 in 2008 — a year he also won Ironman Coeur d’Alene.
Evans now has his own dental practise in Penticton and is raising a young family, and while he no longer races competitively, he still participates in events such as the Elevator Race from Penticton Apex Mountain Resort.