AS I SEE IT COLUMN: All hail Canadian champion Niverville Nighthawks

It is impossible to put into context just how massive, just how exceptional it is that the Niverville Nighthawks, in only their fourth year in existence, are the best junior A hockey club in the nation.

Going through the Centennial Cup without a loss? Impressive. Being crowned the best junior A team in Canada at such an early age of an organization? Historic.

Some context is needed here to at least try and explain how big the Nighthawk’s championship season was.

In the storied history of Canadian hockey, there had been only three Manitoba teams that had won the Centennial Cup before this year’s tournament. The Portage Terriers have done it twice (in 1973, led by Blumenort’s scoring sensation Randy Penner, who scored an astounding 34 goals in 24 Centennial Cup playoff games that year, including a hat trick in the deciding game. The Terriers won again in 2015). The Selkirk Steelers did it the following season in 1974, thanks to a core of fantastic hockey players from Steinbach (Andy Stoez, Ken Neufeld, Randy Reimer, Ray Mutcheson and Chester Reimer.)

The Terriers have been a junior A team for 94 years. The Steelers organization has been around for 60 years. That Niverville has achieved national championship status in four short years is beyond astonishing.

Two other MJHL teams got close to winning Centennial Cup. The Blues, who have been around since 1978, were in the dance in 1982. The Winkler Flyers date back to 1980 and have competed for the national title twice, in 1992 and 2024.

The entire Nighthawks organization should be congratulated for their momentous accomplishment. From Clare Braun, who dreamed of bringing a junior team to Niverville to Mike McAulay, the general manager who put together the team’s powerful roster, to the owners, the coaching staff, the board, the front office, fans, billets, corporate supporters and volunteers.

A championship team cannot be built unless it has championship people running it and working hard to support it. You can’t have players on the ice unless a lot of time, sweat, money, dedication and love are baked into the idea of not just having a team in the MJHL, but to dominate it. To not just try and get to the nationals, but to be a favourite, live up to the hype and bring home the Centennial Cup.

All the people who toil behind the scenes for the Nighthawks can give themselves a well-deserved pat on the back. Your collective efforts have done something historic, something your town and hockey club will never forget.

Lastly, big-time congratulations to the players who made it all happen. You had a dominant MJHL season and playoff run and then you go to the Centennial Cup in Summerside, P.E.I. and run through the entire tournament without a loss. And you did all that as an organization that has only existed for four years. It’s breathtaking.

Participating in the Centennial Cup brings its own innate challenges. But to go P.E.I. rated as the #2 rated team in all of Canada and one of the favourites to win the tournament, brought an entirely new and intense pressure to the players.

But instead of buckling under that pressure and those high expectations, they responded with a championship performance for the ages.

One can only imagine the phone calls and emails that GM McAulay is getting from other organizations around the country, asking what the secret is to achieving something so special, so quickly.

Well done to everyone associated with the Niverville Nighthawks, the best junior A hockey team in all the land.