A hockey tournament that commemorates one tragedy paused to recognize another at the Bradford West Gwillimbury Leisure Centre on Saturday.
At the start of the Dunsmuir Memorial Hockey tournament game between the Bantam A Bradford Bulldogs and Whitby Wildcats, there was a moment of silence to mark the one-year anniversary of the deadly bus crash in Saskatchewan that took the lives of 16 members of the Humboldt Broncos hockey team.
The Dunsmuir Memorial Hockey Tournament, held annually by the East Gwillimbury Minor Hockey Association, is a memorial to the Holland Landing family tragically killed in a devastating fire on March 29, 2013.
The fire took the lives of four members of one family – Kevin, Jenny, Robert and Cameron Dunsmuir. Both Robert and Cameron were hockey players who began their careers in the East Gwillimbury hockey association. Robert Dunsmuir had been drafted to the OHL’s Owen Sound Attack.
A hockey tournament that was ongoing at the time of the blaze was renamed in their memory.
The Ontario Minor Hockey Association-sanctioned tournament and tyke jamboree took place April 4-7 in both Bradford and East Gwillimbury, with games in the Novice, Minor Atom, Atom, Minor Peewee, Peewee, Minor Bantam and Bantam A divisions.
Mayor Rob Keffer, Deputy Mayor James Leduc and Coun. Gary Baynes joined referees and players on the ice for a moment of silence before the start of the Bantam A game at the Blue Rink.
