Hockeyville Hub: West Lorne, Day 1

Kraft Hockeyville, now in its 15th year, awards winning communities in Canada a once-in-a-lifetime experience for hockey fans. This year, two different communities, West Lorne, Ontario, and Sydney, Nova Scotia, are hosting preseason games, with the Buffalo Sabres and Toronto Maple Leafs playing at Joe Thornton Community Centre in St. Thomas, Ontario, on Wednesday (6:30 p.m. ET; NHLN, SN, TVAS), and the Florida Panthers and Ottawa Senators facing off at Centre 200 in Sydney on Sunday. In each community, the local rink received $250,000 in arena upgrades, and there will be festivities and player appearances prior to the games. NHL.com staff writer Jon Lane is in West Lorne to provide all the sights, sounds, highlights and news.

Cherries, tractors and Hockeyville

West Lorne is linked by Elgin County Road 76 to Highway 401 giving access to Windsor, Chatham, St. Thomas, London, Brantford and Toronto. I landed in Toronto on Monday and drove two hours southwest down Highway 403 to the 401 to London, my headquarters for the first leg of another Kraft Hockeyville adventure.

The journey was a milestone and a sense of déjà vu. I covered my first Hockeyville Canada five years ago, taking the same route to London and then 30 minutes north to Lucan Community Memorial Centre. Voting has kept me on the East Coast for subsequent visits, Renous, New Brunswick, in 2019, and after a three-year absence due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Elsipogtog First Nation, New Brunswick, for Hockeyville 2021.

The NHL has had to make up for lost time by holding two events each of the past two years. Last fall, Twillingate, Newfoundland and Labrador, the 2020 winner, preceded Elsipogtog First Nation. This time it’s West Lorne and Sydney, Nova Scotia, victorious in 2022, later this week. Geography is allowing me to visit both communities, each with tales of coming together to campaign for a noble cause.

West Lorne, 45 minutes from London, is a small community offering natural wonders and roadside attractions. The population is 1,300, their rallying cry “We may be small, but we are mighty.” That resolve helped them host Hockeyville and the Sabres-Maple Leafs preseason game and receive funding to renovate West Lorne Arena.

The town hosted the West Lorne Cherry Festival in July and the West Lorne Optimist Tractor Pull in August. Both are popular annual events drawing crowds from around the region. Though Hockeyville leaves town after the game, hockey is forever rooted in West Lorne, where people will return again and again to experience and relive something new.

Ask Jessica Small, who with Maryjo Tait organized the winning bid.

“It shows that hockey is everywhere, and it touches everyone in this community,” she said.