Lethbridge Broncos league championship to be celebrated tonight

By Lethbridge Herald on February 9, 2023.

By Justin Seward

Lethbridge Herald

The Lethbridge Hurricanes are celebrating the 40th anniversary of the Lethbridge Broncos 1983 WHL championship tonight at the Enmax Centre.

Members of that 1983 team will be on hand, a pre-game ceremony will commence before the game to honour Lethbridge’s first WHL championship and the Hurricanes will wear the Broncos jersey that will have the name of the Bronco that wore that number across the bottom of the uniform.

“It was important for us to recognize the accomplishment of such a great team that played in 1982-1983 and won the WHL championship,” said Terry Huisman, Hurricanes general manager of business operations.

“You know, I think that the time was right with the 40 years and I think it was a great opportunity to maybe get some of the guys back to the arena and give them another go of appreciation.”

The organization reached out to Rich and Ron Sutter to help with the event.

“They got the ball in motion here, and they were a big part of it and we appreciate everything they’ve done on their end,” said Huisman.

“And they got a hold of basically everybody on the team and let them know what we were doing. And you know the ones that could commit, have committed, and we’ll have a fairly good number of past players and management … that will be here to be honoured.”

Huisman confirmed there will be close to 10 players and upwards of four to five staff.

“We know how hard it is to win in this league obviously,” said Huisman.

“So it’s a tremendous accomplishment by this team to have done what they have done. If you knew the story, they started off slow and ended up winning it all in the end. You know, you really got to admire a team that played with such a tenaciousness, and you know was able to bring it home. They fell short obviously in the Memorial Cup, but that was a heckuva an accomplishment to win the championship just alone.”

Huisman thinks it’s going to be good for the current Hurricanes team to see a championship team be recognized.

“I mean obviously they can see a team that’s paid the price and gone to the wall every night to meet their goals and to win that championship, and I mean that’s the ultimate goal of our hockey team and every one of our players has that drive,” said Huisman.

“I think it’ll be good for them to see and how fans treat the team, being the Broncos, and I think moving forward it’ll help them understand what it means to not only themselves and to the  hockey careers of their own, but also to the City of Lethbridge.”

A meet and greet will be at the Hurricanes game.

The jerseys will be up for auction.