Finalists have been named for the 2017 Molson Coors St. John’s athlete of the year awards and the list of nominees includes two winners from 2016.
Paralympic athlete Liam Hickey, who took male athlete of the year honours last year, is up for the award again, with runner Colin Fewer and hockey player Tyler Boland the other finalists.
Hickey, who also played internationally for Canada in wheelchair basketball, is soon heading to South Korea to compete with Canada’s sledge hockey team at the 2018 Paralympic Games; Fewer is coming off a stellar running season that included a record 10th win in the Tely 10; and Boland finished up as runner-up in scoring in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League before having a successful start to his intercollegiate hockey career with the University of New Brunswick.
The defending Brier and world men’s curling champions, skipped by Brad Gushue and also including Mark Nichols, Brett Gallant and Geoff Walker, are looking for a repeat of their 2016 St. John’s team of the year win, with the Holy Cross Avalon Ford women’s soccer team and Atlantic Rock U19 rugby team the challengers this time around.
The Holy Cross women captured a bronze medal at the Canadian Jubilee Trophy competition, this province’s best-ever national finish. The young Rock rugby players also claimed a national bronze medal; it came at the Canadian U19 championship in Nova Scotia.,
Finalists for the female athlete of the year award are all-star varsity athletes. Included are soccer players Alyssa Armstrong and Jessie Noseworthy, and volleyballer Jill Snow.
Noseworthy almost won the St. John’s award last year, as she and baseball player Heather Healey both finished a single point behind soccer player Hannah Rivkin.
Both Armstrong and Noseworthy played for the Holy Cross women’s soccer champions, with Noseworthy finishing as top scorer in provincial Jubilee Trophy play and also being named league MVP.
Both were Jubilee Trophy all-stars and AUS first-team all-stars — Armstrong for the 2017 conference champion Cape Breton Capers and Noseworthy after once again leading the Memorial Sea-Hawks in scoring. Noseworthy was also a national U Sports second-team all-star.
Snow was named the AUS women’s volleyball MVP for a second straight year after the Memorial outside hitter led the conference in scoring. She was also named a U Sports first-team all-star.
The 2017 winners will be named at a banquet Monday night at the Foran/Greene Room at St. John’s City Hall.
