When the Oshawa Sports Hall of Fame welcomes five inductees to the fold on Wednesday, May 25, at the General Motors Centre, a total of 180 marquee individuals and teams will have been recognized, representing 43 sporting categories during a 26-year span.
The list of this year’s inductees is indeed impressive.
Those to be acknowledged when the curtain is raised before a plethora of friends, family members and sports fans in Oshawa are as follows:
Dr. Margot Mountjoy in the sport of synchronized swimming as an athlete and builder.
Dale Edward Degray in the sport of hockey as an athlete.
Ross Jones in the sport of lacrosse as an athlete.
Albert James Barnes as an athlete in the multi-sport category.
Frank Sobil as an athlete and builder of bowling and soccer.
Ross Jones came oh, so close to playing in all seven Canadian Minto Cup championships won by the junior Oshawa Green Gaels from 1963-69.
Alas, his keen talent never came to prominence until the 1964 season. Only Don Stinson was around to celebrate each national title under the tutorship of the late, great Jim Bishop.
“Hockey, baseball and lacrosse in Oshawa was a golden era during the ‘60s,” Jones, a retired realtor, recalls,. “and we were right in the middle of it. There was so much buzz at that time because we had so many winning teams.”
The Gaels were, of course, considered a powerhouse with athletes such as Jones, Stinson, Johnny Davis and Gaylord Powless racking up the points.
“We were an all-star team in Ontario with the team concept Bishop had planted. The discipline he instilled helped make us go the distance with seven championships. For me, yes, I had success. But it was because of the guys I had around me. I just happened to catch the ball and be closest to the net.”
Jones left the Gaels as the third all-time leading scorer in the Ontario junior circuit with 359 goals and in 1967, he was recipient of the Ken Ross Trophy, focussing on his ability and sportsmanship in the Ontario Lacrosse Association (OLA).
He copped the Advertiser Trophy the following year as the top scorer in the OLA with 101 goals and 59 assists.
After marriage, his commitment to real estate and a brief stopover with the senior Brooklin Redmen, Jones put on his pro hat five years later when the National Lacrosse
League (NLL) was born. Jones would go on to play with Detroit, Philadelphia and Montreal.
“I put my name in the draft and got drafted in the second round by the Philadelphia Wings. Most of the crowd there were Peterborough boys,” he laughs. “I wasn’t there long, though. I got a call and was told I was traded and that was a shock for me. I felt that five years out of the game, I wasn’t cutting it.
“The good side was reunited with (Bishop) because he was coaching in Montreal. I really owed him a lot. We were good friends. Sure, we had some differences along the way but I, like so many others, respected him.”
Jones was inducted into the Ontario Lacrosse Hall of Fame in 1997 and joined his Gaels teammates into the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame three years later.
To read the full story by ally Donaldson of the The Oshawa Express please click here http://www.oshawaexpress.ca/viewposting.php?view=875
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