|
Local Sports
| News
| Sports | Prep Sports | Business
| Opinions | Columns
| Entertainment |
| Science/Technology| Weather
| Archives | E-mail
Us |
Saturday, March 25, 2000
Bummer: IceRay's star 2nd in league MVP vote
By Mark Button
Caller-Times
Geoff Bumstead was not surprised when he heard the news Friday morning.
Around 9:45 a.m., the Corpus Christi right wing found out that Central Texas' Ron Newhook edged him out for the Western Professional Hockey League's Most Valuable Player award.
Bumstead said he heard late last week that the 22-year-old Newhook, who is a plus-51 in plus-minus ratio and leads the Stampede in scoring with 108 points, had at least six more first-place votes than Bumstead.
"If I hadn't heard about the vote count, I would have been surprised," said Bumstead, who entered Friday night's game as the WPHL's scoring leader with 117 points. Bumstead's WPHL peers voted him the league's best fighter a year ago and he said he thought his penchant for punching probably took votes away from him. That is ironic to the 5-foot-10, 215-pound forward from Winnipeg, Manitoba because he said his physical toughness combined with his scoring touch should have won him the MVP award. "I would like to ask all the coaches in the league who they would rather have on their team, Newhook or me," Bumstead said. "I don't know what kind of physical presence he brings and he's not outscoring me. So I'd like to know what criteria (the voters) were using."
Bumstead did say that it was an honor to be nominated for the award and that he respected the offensive ability of Newhook, Lubbock's Kyle Reeves and Odessa's Paul Vincent, who were the other finalists.
"I can't be mad because they're all good players," he said.
Last year, Bumstead became the first WPHL player to register at least 25 goals and 25 fights. He said he will use the fact that he did not win the MVP award for motivation during the IceRays' playoff run.
"It gives me a new point to prove," he said. "I guess I could have retired after this year if I did win it. But now I can't retire."
Staff writer Mark Button can be reached at 886-3613 or by e-mail at buttonm@caller.com
| Talk
about this story | Next Story
| Home |
© 2000,
a Scripps Howard newspaper. All rights reserved.
|
 |
 |
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
|
