Membership in the Burlington Sports Hall of Fame will grow by six when induction ceremonies are held next month.
Four of them are in the builder category, one goes in as an athlete and the other — skilled international hockey player and now junior coach Mark Jooris — will represent the city in both the builder and athlete category.
Father and son team Jim and Brady Reardon coached and competed internationally in kayaking.
Peter Moore culminated a long career in officiating by taking on the job as the first ever Halton Secondary School Athletic Association convener.
John Tait was a mainstay in rep hockey for 40 years, founding what would become the Burlington City Rep Hockey Club.
And, Lisa Turbitt highlighted a long umpiring career by being the first woman to officiate a World Baseball Classic qualifying game in 2022.
All six will be honoured when the BSHOF holds its annual induction reception on Tuesday, May 28 at the Burlington Golf and Country Club. Tickets for the event are sold out.
The latest inductees were chosen in a BSHOF vote in February.
Currently the coach of the Burlington Cougars of the Ontario Junior Hockey League, Jooris wowed onlookers as a Cougar player in 1981-82, setting team records for points (127) and assists (86) before heading to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute to play NCAA hockey with the Engineers. There he helped his team win a national championship (1985), recording 183 points in 117 games from 1982-86. He had a stellar career in Europe, playing for pro teams in Finland and Germany and also competed in the American Hockey League.
Jooris was behind the bench with the Oakville Blades, Markham Waxers and the Cougars and was named OHA coach of the year in 2016.
Moore refereed as a member of the Lakeshore Football Officials Association for 40 years, and officiated in Ontario University Football almost as long. He was also comfortable officiating fastball and basketball games. In 1990 he became the first athletic convener in the Halton Secondary School Athletic Association, a job he held until retiring in 2005.
Jim Reardon was head coach for Burlington’s Mohawk Canoe Club in 1970 and guided K-4 1,000-metre paddlers at the Munich Olympics in 1972. He was assistant coach on two world junior gold teams in 1981 and six world senior championship teams from 1979-87. In the same position at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, he helped Canada to a gold and silver medal.
Son Brady qualified for the first of many ICF world championship competitions in 2007, finished ninth at the Beijing Olympics in 2008 before earning a World Cup silver in the K-1 500 metres in 2012. He teamed with Oakville’s Adam van Koeverden at a World Cup race in 2013 to win the K-2 1,000m.
Reardon teamed with Andrew Jessop to finish seventh in the K-1 1,000 metres final at the world championships in 2014.
John Tait dedicated four decades to minor hockey, founding a rep hockey program that eventually became the Burlington City Rep Hockey Club, starting a 25-year stint as president in 1995. Tait had a lot to do with the successes of the annual Ron Wilkins Memorial, which he founded, and Golden Horseshoe hockey tournaments. He also co-founded The Gift of Giving Back, one of Canada’s largest food drives.
Lisa Turbitt’s long involvement with umpiring stretches more than 40 years. In addition to umpiring world class men’s baseball two years ago, Turbitt broke many barriers for women throughout her career. It led to her being the first woman to win a Baseball Canada Lifetime Achievement Award last year.
A national level umpire since 1995, Turbitt’s workload included more than 20 Canadian national championships as either an umpire or supervisor, with another 10 at international competitions. Turbitt officiated at the Women’s Baseball World Cup gold-medal game in 2004.
