{"id":11572,"date":"2015-08-12T13:46:20","date_gmt":"2015-08-12T17:46:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=11572"},"modified":"2015-08-19T15:09:22","modified_gmt":"2015-08-19T19:09:22","slug":"ex-nhler-new-owner-of-aurora-tigers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/ex-nhler-new-owner-of-aurora-tigers\/","title":{"rendered":"Ex-NHL’er new owner of Aurora Tigers"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Jake Courtepatte<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Aurora Tigers Junior A hockey club has gone under a major overhaul the last few weeks, most recently announcing the purchase of the team by ex-NHL player Jim Thomson.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy wife Rita and I are extremely excited to embark on this new journey within our hometown of Aurora,\u201d said Thomson. \u201cWe\u2019re a passionate hockey family and are eager to continue and build on the success that the prior ownership and coach James Richmond have built.\u201d <\/p>\n

The news comes just one week after the announcement of Richmond accepting an assistant coaching job with the OHL\u2019s Mississauga Steelheads, replaced behind the bench in Aurora by Mark Joslin, a successful coach in Brampton minor hockey.<\/p>\n

Thomson brings to the Tigers a decade of NHL experience, selected 185th overall by the Washington Capitals in 1984. Through the next ten years, he had stints with the Hartford Whalers, New Jersey Devils, Los Angeles Kings, Ottawa Senators, and Mighty Ducks of Anaheim.<\/p>\n

In total, he racked up 114 regular season games played in the NHL.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy years of experience in the NHL have given me a platform to help and mentor many young individuals and I hope to continue this within the Aurora Tigers\u2019 organization. It\u2019s long been a dream of mine to be part of an organization like this, and both Rita and I pledge to uphold the standards and respect of what the Aurora Tigers stand for.\u201d <\/p>\n

Known as a tough guy in his professional hockey years, Thomson now puts his time towards motivational speaking and life-coaching. He travels the country with his \u201cDreams Do Come True\u201d presentation, looking to inspire youth to follow their dreams. <\/p>\n

The 49-year old from Edmonton is now actively involved in his adopted town of Aurora, both in and out of the sporting world. He played emcee at the 2014 Sport Aurora Breakfast of Champions.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe look forward to the start of a new season and meeting the many new faces throughout the Aurora community\u201d.<\/p>\n

A short pre-season is only a few weeks away, with the Tigers\u2019 early playoff exit last season still fresh in the minds of returning players. The league\u2019s top team was knocked out in the first round by the Kingston Voyageurs.<\/p>\n

The regular season is set to kick off in early September.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Aurora Tigers Junior A hockey club has gone under a major overhaul the last few weeks, most recently announcing the purchase of the team by ex-NHL player Jim Thomson.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11572","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-30E","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-14 02:51:53","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11572","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11572"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11572\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}