Castlegar Rebels’ goalie, Ethan Lawczynski, has been named the recipient of the Grant Sheridan Scholarship for this season’s Kootenay International Junior Hockey League.
Each year, the MindRight for Society awards the $1500 scholarship to one exceptional student athlete in the league, in honour of long time Kelowna Chiefs owners, Grant Sheridan.
For Lawczynski, it’s recognition for a season well done.
“It feels pretty good, I know there is a lot of worthy applicants who have applied, so it feels good they chose me to be the recipient.” said Ethan.
Lawczynski finished out his season with a 9-11 save percentage and a 3-10 goals against average.
“That’s not the best stats I have had in the season, but it was enough to where I was able to get my team win when we needed them.” said Ethan.
But the highlight of his Rebels career is playing on his home ice.
“Overall, I had a ton of fun playing for my hometown, its great,” he said.
“My parents, family and friends get to come and watch me most of the games I get to play, and we finished out the year with our last game in Castlegar which was nice to have my hockey career come full circle and finish out in my own rink.”
And even while the 20-year-old might be aging out of the local league, but there is still plenty of opportunity ahead
The scholarship will assist Lawczynski off the ice, with his tuition coats while he studies engineering with the University of Alberta.
But he’ll always be a Rebel at heart.
“The Rebels, they took me in as a 16 year old and I am really grateful for the opportunity they gave me to be able to play in my home town.” said Ethan.
Ethan is the fifth recipient of the Remembering Grant Sheridan Scholarship, joining Ethan Sanders (100 Mile House Wranglers) in 2023, Nathan Hannon (Osoyoos Coyotes) in 2022, Josh Wiens (Castlegar Rebels) in 2021 and Angus Amadio (Beaver Valley Nitehawks) in 2020.
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