Sekura, Chris

HOCKEY WAS THE THING TO DO in Taber, Alberta, the corn capital of Canada, and he and his brother were no different. Born there on October 31st 1975 into a family with cultural ties to Yugoslavia, he began the sport at the age of 3. He moved to Australia and won his first Goodall Cup as a forward for New South Wales in 1999 when he was 23. He played for the Blacktown Bullets in the East Coast Super League, scoring an average of 1.6 points per game. There was no national team representation in Sydney's West when the League folded in 2000 until John Wilson, owner of the Blacktown Ice Arena, financed the second Sydney team in the Australian Ice Hockey League in 2002.

In the meantime, he joined the Sydney Bears for the inaugural season of the AIHL in 2000. In 2001, the Bears were runners-up in the single-game playoff of the 2001 Goodall Cup. In 2002, at 27, he became foundation captain of the Western Sydney Ice Dogs for their inaugural season of the AIHL. He was captain again in 2003, later wore the "A", and played for the Club until he turned 40 in 2015, a total of 13 seasons. In that time, he scored 46 goals 79 assists for an average of 0.76 points per game, and won two more Goodall Cups (2004, '13). After his retirement as a player, he became assistant coach to Vlad Rubes for the Ice Dogs' 2016 season.

He first represented Australia in the 2004 IIHF Division 2 World Championships in Jaca Spain winning Bronze. He recorded the Most Assists for Australia that year and was second top point scorer on 2 goals 9 assists behind Vlad Rubes on 5 goals 7 assists. He represented Australia again in Zagreb (2005); Auckland ('06), Seoul ('07), Newcastle Australia ('08), Mexico City ('10) and Melbourne ('11) for a total of 33 games over 7 tournaments. He averaged 1.12 points a game for Australia, winning 2 Gold, 3 Silver and a Bronze medal. He was Alternate Captain of Australia in 2007.