Coach Hunt wins second straight NPHL Coach-of-the-Year award

Chirs Clegg
South Peace News

High Prairie Regals’ coach Lee Hunt has won his second straight North Peace Hockey League Coach-of-the-Year award. The NPHL released its awards list Feb. 26. Hunt, who also won the award last year, received five votes compared to four votes for Fort St. John Flyers’ coach Rob Larson. Hunt’s award marks the third time in four years a Regals’ coach has won the award. Arlen Quartly won the award in 2003-04. Hunt was not the only local winner of a major award. Although he plays for the Horse Lake Thunder, Travis Cunningham won the Most Valuable Player award. He received seven votes compared to two for Grimshaw Huskies’ forward Terry Houlder. Cunningham also won the MVP award in 1996-97 and 1997-98 when playing for the Lakeland Eagles. The Houlder family was not shut out of major awards. Terry’s son, Chris, was named the Rookie-of-the–Year. He received seven votes compared to two for Jeff Fast of the Fort St. John Flyers. Jordan Bombier of the Grande Prairie Athletics was named Most Gentlemanly Player; his second major award for his career. He received five votes compared to four for runner-up Darcy Haugan of the Peace River Stampeders. Bombier also won the NPHL Rookie-of-the–Year award in 2002-03. Troy Hunt of the Flyers was named Best Goaltender. He received eight of nine votes over Kenton Yasinski of the Manning Comets. The Best Defenceman award went to Horse Lake’s Kip Noble. Like Hunt, he received eight of nine votes. It’s Noble’s fifth Best Defenceman award. Teams from each division nominated a player for each award during the first round of balloting. Teams were each allowed one vote with a team not allowed to vote in any category where their player was nominated. South Peace News will publish the voting results in next week’s newspaper. Space prohibited the publication of results this week. Following is a list of the All-Star teams: West Division All-Star Team Goaltender - Troy Hunt, Fort St. John Defenceman - Kip Noble, Horse Lake Defenceman - Gerard Dicaire, Fort St. John Centre - Travis Cunningham, Horse Lake Right Wing - Todd Alexander, Fort St. John Left Wing - Faron Duthie, Spirit River East Division All-Star Team Goaltender - Kenton Yasinski, Manning Defenceman - Jared May, Manning Defenceman - Mark Sloan, Peace River Centre - Terry Houlder, Grimshaw Right Wing - Ryan Reeves, Valleyview Left Wing - Aaron Parenteau, Peace River

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