Former Abbotsford Soccer Association head coach Colin Miller has been fired from his post as an assistant coach with the Vancouver Whitecaps.
Miller, a former Canadian national team player and coach, joined the Whitecaps in 2010 under Teitur Thordarson. Thordarson was fired 12 games into the 2011 season, Vancouver’s first in Major League Soccer, and Miller stayed on under interim bench boss Tom Soehn. But with Martin Rennie set to take the head coaching reins on a permanent basis, the Whitecaps let Miller and fellow assistant Denis Hamlett go on Thursday in order to allow Rennie to assemble his own staff.
Miller served two stints as ASA head coach – 2000 to 2007, and 2009-10.
- The Honda Way Tournament, the University of the Fraser Valley’s inaugural preseason men’s basketball event, tips off tonight (Friday) at the Envision Athletic Centre.
The tourney features the Guelph Gryphons, an Ontario University Athletics program; the Thompson Rivers WolfPack, one of the Cascades’ Canada West rivals; and the Northwest University Eagles, an NAIA squad from Kirkland, Wash.
Friday’s action sees TRU take on Northwest (6 p.m.), and UFV against Guelph (8 p.m.). On Saturday, Guelph faces TRU, followed by UFV vs. Northwest (7 p.m.).
- Abbotsford has won the right to host the 2012 Senior B Western Canadian Fastpitch Championships for men and women, and the organizing committee is beginning the process of lining up sponsors and volunteers.
The event runs Aug. 16-19 at Exhibition Park. For more information, email westerns2012@gmail.com.
- Kellan Tochkin of Abbotsford was involved in a Western Hockey League trade this week, moving from the Medicine Hat Tigers to the Prince Albert Raiders.
Tochkin, a 20-year-old right winger who signed with the Vancouver Canucks as a free agent in 2009, is in his final season of junior eligibility. He was obtained by the Raiders in exchange for defenceman James Bettauer and a sixth-round bantam draft pick. Tochkin had eight points – all assists – in 10 games with Medicine Hat this season, and has scored 214 points in 227 WHL appearances with the Everett Silvertips and Tigers over the course of his junior career.
Fellow Abbotsford native Joey Kornelsen was also on the move, as the Moose Jaw Warriors sent him to the Calgary Hitmen as part of a four-player trade. Kornelsen, an 18-year-old forward, had one goal and four assists in 12 games with the Warriors this season.
- Jill Saunders and Aaron Pauls have been named the University of the Fraser Valley’s athletes of the week.
Saunders, a fourth-year setter on the women’s volleyball team, led the Cascades to a pair of straight-sets victories over crosstown rival Columbia Bible College last weekend. Pauls paced the UFV men’s golf team to a bronze medal at the CCAA national championships in Charlottetown, PEI, and finished fourth in the individual standings. He was named a CCAA All-Canadian for his efforts.