Two athletes from the Alberni Valley have been named to Team BC teams heading to the National Aboriginal Hockey Championships, May 5–11 on Treaty 8 territory in Grande Prairie, Alta.
Wyatt Blace of Crofton, a forward with the Alberni Valley Bulldogs of the B.C. Hockey League, was named to the male roster, and athletic trainer Daley Forbes from the Port Alberni Bombers in the Vancouver Island Junior Hockey League was named to the female roster. Blace and the Bulldogs are competing in the BCHL Coastal Conference semifinals.
Forbes, from Hesquiaht First Nation, says the opportunity gives her a chance to give back to her community “and embrace culture with sports.”
A registered kinesiologist with Ridge View Health and Performance in Port Alberni, Forbes has been involved in sports for “my whole life,” she says. She was a well known wrestler with the ADSS Wrestling team and Alberni Wrestling. She has spent the past three seasons serving as athletic therapist for the Junior A hockey Bombers.
Last July she travelled with Team BC U19 and U16 male lacrosse teams to Halifax for the North American Indigenous Games. She has worked with the ADSS wrestling team, rugby teams and the Bombers.
“I had just finished my Bachelor’s Degree in Athletic and Exercise Therapy (BAET) at Camosun College and moved back to Port Alberni as they were announcing that Alberni would be home to one of the expansion teams going into the VIJHL. So that was a perfect way to continue working with a sports team and in a local multidisciplinary clinic in the Valley.”
She brings awareness of athletic therapy to the Alberni Valley and Nuu-chah-nulth communities, where she educates and empowers clients to manage pain or injury in order to maximize function.
The Indigenous Sport, Physical Activity and Recreation Council (I-SPARC) held a Team BC player selection camp from April 5-7 in Prince George, where more than 150 elite Indigenous male and female hockey players participated in the three-day process. From the camp, 20 male and 20 female were selected along with coaching and training staff.