The Stanley Cup in St. Laurent

All year long, the players of St. Laurent’s Minor Hockey Association took part in a series of fundraising activities to earn money for Montreal’s Children Hospital. This year, they were able to exceed their goal by twice as much as the objective as they raised, $2,000. To reward them for all their hard work, Pre-Novice Hockey Director Michael Delis wanted to do something special. “Someone told me it could be possible to bring the Cup here, so I started working on that. I made some calls to the Hockey Hall of Fame, to the Borough and to the hospital and everything worked out great.” All of this may seem quite easy, but considering the Cup was in Kandahar, Afghanistan a few days prior, that the playoffs are about to begin and that it takes a good number of precautions before going in the hospital’s oncology ward; doing an event like this was a pretty good challenge.

At 3:30 p.m., the Pre-Novice children celebrated the season’s end with their annual banquet. Then, at 6:30 p.m., Lord Stanley’s Cup headed to the Montreal’s Children Hospital.

“The whole day was amazing, but the highlight was when we visited the children at the hospital, said Mr. Delis with an emotion-filled voice. I was tired from our long day, but when I saw the kids’ reaction and their smiles, it gave me a boost. It’s during those times that you really see the power of the Cup.”

Michael Delis named the event The Cup of Dreams. After a day like this, where the lone presence of a trophy was enough to bring happiness and joy to more than a hundred children, he couldn’t have picked a better name.

(Photo: Jacques Pharand)