Kraft Hockeyville win ‘brought a lot of people together’ for Elliot Lake

Gord Ouimet is an Elliot Lake, Ontario, resident since the 1950s and what one would call a hockey lifer. His father, Gord Sr., was a significant fundraiser for the Arena Fund Committee that led to the construction and opening of Centennial Arena.

Gord Jr. was a forward for the original Elliot Lake Vikings that debuted in the International Junior B Hockey League in 1965. He played for Lakehead University (Thunder Bay) in 1976-77, returned as Vikings president in 1970 and has devoted his life to coaching minor hockey in the Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League for more than 40 years.

Ouimet recently told a local girl the story of a dormant 55-year-old landmark. He showed her a beam he helped build when he was 14.

"All the different interest groups in town were assigned one arch to assemble in the building and then a big crane would put it in place on top of the pillars," Ouimet said. "We all literally had a hand in building it."

Virtually everyone throughout Northern Ontario had a hand in Elliot Lake winning Kraft Hockeyville, $250,000 in arena upgrades and $10,000 worth of youth hockey equipment from the NHLPA Goals & Dreams fund. A community overlooking Lake Huron with an estimated 2024 population of 11,768 and 5 1/2 hours northwest of Toronto will be celebrated when the Pittsburgh Penguins play the Ottawa Senators at Sudbury Community Arena on Sunday (7 p.m. ET; NHLN, SN, SN1, SN-PIT).

The Penguins make their Hockeyville Canada debut after going 1-1-0 in the United States. The Senators are 3-4-0 in Canada and participating for the third straight year. Forward Drake Batherson played hero at the 2021 event that exalted Elsipogtog First Nation, New Brunswick, by scoring 2:45 into overtime to lift Ottawa to a 3-2 win against the Montreal Canadiens at J.K. Irving Centre in Bouctouche. Fifty-one weeks later in honor of 2023 winner Sydney, Nova Scotia, Batherson returned to where he played major junior hockey with four points (one goal, three assists) to defeat the Florida Panthers 4-2 at Centre 200.

Hockeyville 2024 is holistic medicine for a community with a checkered past. Elliot Lake was established in 1955 following the discovery of uranium in the area. According to legend, it was named after a cook from a logging camp lost in the bush while fishing. He was found in good health on a shore of what would be called "the lake where Elliot got found," shortened to Elliot's Lake and then Elliot Lake.

The town's original Ojibwe tribe name is Mooshgodne'gamiing, translated to “The lake is full of an abundance of fish.” The original Vikings brought a surplus of joy followed by what felt like nonstop bad news. The uranium mines closed in the early 1990s. The Vikings left for Nickel Centre in 1999, returning as a NOJHA expansion team in 2014 and then a roof collapse just before the end of the 2018-19 season forced a move to Blind River. The COVID-19 pandemic led to a one-year leave from the league in 2020-21. Rebranded the Red Wings, a sale effective Oct. 1, 2022, brought back the original Vikings name.

Once Centennial Arena reopens, facilities will be modern and fully operational, kids no longer traveling two-hours plus to play a game.

"What it means to me is (Hockeyville) should be here," Ouimet said. "What it means to me is it's something that is going to continue. There's a buzz in the town that something positive is happening."

It means a lot to Bryan MacKay, a member of Elliot Lake Minor and Major Hockey for 50 years as a teacher and coach recognized as the town's 2023 Civic Award Recipient. It means the world to minor hockey president Amanda McKay, a big player behind the rally. It means that much to former resident Jamie Armstrong that the founder of supply chain management company Blue Yonder Group, Inc. (formerly JDA Software Group) in Scottsdale, Arizona, started The Jamie and Jo-Ann Armstrong Centennial Arena Fundraising Challenge with a $300,000 donation April 12.

It raised $904,380 through Sept. 22, including the $250,000 grand prize, and exceeded the original goal of $500,000 with a new objective of $1 million by the community celebration at Collins Hall on Friday.

"Hockeyville brought a lot of people together, more so than we thought," MacKay said. "Maybe not a lot of the, per se, hockey people, but a lot of the people out there supporting us. The spirit was really good."

Two days before Centennial Arena failed a building inspection with the fear of a collapse, the Vikings rallied from down 5-3 in the third period and forward Dylan Leslie scored 1:24 into overtime for a 6-5 win against Timmins Rock before a boisterous crowd of 480 on Sept. 9, 2023. The season ended with home games at Blind River Community Centre and a 33-game losing streak, but it ignited another campaign to win Hockeyville after numerous failures since 2014.

Christine Brunet, a native of Sault Ste. Marie and a local realtor since 2010, composed one of the first nominating stories about the importance for kids and their mental health to have a place to play.

McKay sensed this time was different. For once, something good was coming.

"That just catapulted everything," she said. "It was just trying to rally the community to understand how to get us nominated. When we got the call that [the NHL was] going to come and do the promo video, we were pretty shocked, actually."

Elliot Lake made the final four March 9. A packed Collins Hall erupted at the March 30 announcement that Hockeyville was theirs. Next is celebrating and then games at their own venue. The Vikings are 0-3-0-0, play the Kirkland Lake Gold Miners on Saturday and have one against the Soo Eagles scheduled for Centennial Arena on Oct. 4.

"It started to put us on the map for the hockey community," McKay said. "Not even just the North Shore, Northern Ontario pulled together and rallied for us. That was really kind of amazing to see all our hockey communities in the north supporting us and helping us win this. I think from our hockey players and our hockey community and even our (figure) skating community being displaced this past season really pushed everybody to share stories and pictures and get the votes in."

The red-carpet arrivals of the Penguins and Senators in Sudbury will be the first and perhaps only chance at handshakes, photos and autographs with NHL players. Those attending are overjoyed at the mere chance of interacting with Sidney Crosby nearly one year after the Penguins captain returned to Scotiabank Centre in Halifax, 10 miles from his native Cole Harbour, for the first time in 17 years. Pittsburgh lost the Nova Scotia Showdown 3-0 to Ottawa on Oct. 2, 2023.

"For the players it's a unique experience to be up close and to get to a community that you might not typically get to," Crosby said. "I know that Halifax was a great experience, going there last year. It wasn't Hockeyville, but similar, kind of playing in a neutral site, so I'm sure it'll be a great experience."

A short time later, the lights will turn back on inside the pulse of Elliot Lake. New stories and fables will be told and retold from Ouimet's beam to what will belong to a community forever.

"Hockeyville," MacKay said. "Everybody gets attached to it."

NHL.com independent correspondent Wes Crosby contributed to this report