{"id":11660,"date":"2015-08-19T15:16:41","date_gmt":"2015-08-19T19:16:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=11660"},"modified":"2015-09-09T08:50:24","modified_gmt":"2015-09-09T12:50:24","slug":"aurora-native-named-trainer-of-the-year-by-ontario-hockey-association","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/aurora-native-named-trainer-of-the-year-by-ontario-hockey-association\/","title":{"rendered":"Aurora native named Trainer of the Year by Ontario Hockey Association"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

After earning the OJHL Trainer of the Year award for his work with the Newmarket Hurricanes, Drew Laskoski has been recognized provincially with the Ontario Hockey Association\u2019s Trainer of the Year trophy.<\/p>\n

The OJHL and OHA Trainer of-the Year awards are awarded to the trainer, therapist or equipment manager that is judged to be the best at his profession for his or her member club throughout the course of the regular season, while past experience and time served will be taken into consideration.<\/p>\n

Laskoski has spent the better part of three decades working with junior hockey clubs across York Region, taking up the position as trainer with the Schomberg Cougars Junior C club after graduating with a Bachelor of Science in Kinesiology from the University of Waterloo.<\/p>\n

His first taste of the Newmarket club came in 1987-88 with the Junior B 87\u2019s, taking the reigns as the club\u2019s head athletic therapist. After two seasons, Laskoski continued his education at Sheridan College with a diploma in Sports Injury Management, while also taking up the position as the University of Toronto Varsity Blue\u2019s trainer for one year.<\/p>\n

He then returned to the 87\u2019s for six more seasons, watching the team transition to the OHL Junior A level, before joining the division rival Stouffville Spirit in 1997. After nine years with the Spirit, he returned to his Newmarket roots in 2007, while also taking up the position as president of the Ontario Athletic Therapist Association.<\/p>\n

His on-again, off-again tenure with Stouffville and Newmarket led him back to the Spirit in 2012, before returning to the Hurricanes last year amidst a front-office shakeup.<\/p>\n

His 28 years of experience, combined with being a \u2018go-to\u2019 trainer for the OHL for events like last December\u2019s Central Canada Cup All-Star Challenges, earned him the title as top trainer for the first time in March.<\/p>\n

It was then the OJHL that sent his name and story into the OHA, the provincial governing body of hockey, where he was given the honour once more.
\nUpon learning of his recognition, Laskoski said he was \u201cvery surprised and honoured.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t do this kind of thing for the recognition, but when they do throw us a bone it\u2019s nice,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

When asked why he has devoted so much of his time to the Newmarket organization, he expressed a need for continuity, as he has been with the club since its beginning stages.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just makes sense to me to be there. I enjoy it \u2013 it\u2019s right in my hometown, I can easily get to the rink, and to be able to offer a superior service to our players is really great.\u201d<\/p>\n

As a Certified Athletic Specialist, Laskoski is the founder and co-owner of Upper Canada Sports Medicine. During this summer\u2019s Pan Am games, he aimed to bring his practice to international attention, providing his services to athletes in wakeboarding, waterskiing and beach volleyball. He was on the host medical team at the 1999 Pan Am Games in Winnipeg, a role he relished.<\/p>\n

\u201cBecause I was out of province, I was free-floating\u2026I ended up covering eight or nine different sports. It was a great experience, and challenging.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After earning the OJHL Trainer of the Year award for his work with the Newmarket Hurricanes, Drew Laskoski has been recognized provincially with the Ontario Hockey Association\u2019s Trainer of the Year trophy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":11624,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_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}},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/2015-08-20-08.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-324","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-04 07:43:25","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\/11660","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=11660"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11660\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}