Kenny Burrows of the Stouffville Spirit received the Gold Stick Award during the Ontario Hockey Association’s Awards Celebration in the Toyota Auditorium at the Cambridge Centre for the Arts June 7
The honour “is an order of merit in hockey awarded by the OHA for outstanding service to the game other than as a player. Such outstanding service must have been for a period of not less than 10 years continuous duration.”
Burrows was named the Ontario Junior Hockey League’s Executive of the year for the second time earlier this year
The Governor and General Manager of the Spirit joined the then two-year-old franchise as a scout in 1997. The lifelong Stouffville resident next spent time as an assistant coach with the team before becoming GM in 2001. Released by the Spirit in 2007, a year after the team lost in the OJHL Championship Series, he went on to become GM of the Collingwood Blues and later worked with the Newmarket Hurricanes (now Milton Menace), both in the OJHL.
A year later, the Spirit had a change of heart and invited Burrows to return as GM. He’s been there ever since. Burrows also co-owns the franchise, along with Zeev Werek and Chris Tambos.
“Kenny has put his whole life into this team,” said Werek, who bought into the Spirit ownership group in 1999. “It’s incredible. He’s just so into it. Kenny is Stouffville and I don’t know what the Spirit would do without him.
“Our organization is always respected and it comes back to Kenny. We’re a lot like the London Knights in the OHL in that regard. Winning is secondary to me. It’s all about the experiences the guys have in Stouffville and I’ve talked to a lot of alumni who say it was the time of their lives. They loved it here.”
Burrows calls this year’s honour “an organizational award more than an individual honour.”
“We have made positive strides the past three years and I’m assuming that’s what people noticed when making this selection,” he told the OJHL. “But this is for everyone involved, from the players, coaches and hockey staff to the training and equipment staff, to the game day staff and our volunteers. Everyone has had a part of it.
“It’s all about providing a fun and safe place for the players to play hockey. We had a great dressing room this year and it didn’t just happen. It takes a few years.
“I think the fans really enjoyed the past three years, too. They showed a lot of support for our team. It’s hand in hand – we came out to their events, they came out to ours.”
Burrows is already at work on improvements for next season, both with the roster and to the facilities at the Stouffville Arena, he said.
Burrows won the OJHL Executive of the Year award the first year it was given out, 2012, which coincided with the year the Spirit won the OJHL championship. He was named Stouffville’s Sports Person of the Year later that year.
