Luke, Elgin

BORN MAY 20TH 1939 in Whitby ON Canada, he attended Toronto High School and developed in the local hockey leagues. He played lacrosse with Charlie Grandy and Phil Hall in the Whitby Red Wings of the Ontario Junior A Lacrosse League. In 1960, they won the Iroquois Trophy and represented Eastern Canada in the finals of the Minto Cup, awarded annually to the national junior champion. They lost to the Westminster Salmonbellies of Vancouver.

He arrived in Australia in 1962 with Grandy and Hall, and was a defenseman for the 1963 NSW Premiers, St George. He represented NSW the same year when they won the Goodall Cup. He was selected to represent Australia in the second Olympic Qualification Team; the Winter Olympic Elimination Series against Japan in 1964. He had moved to Melbourne that year to join the Blackhawks with whom he played for six years. He also coached the 'Hawks in his sixth year, prior to transferring to the Monarchs as a player-coach, winning three Kleiner Cups (Victorian Premierships).

He won two more Goodall Cups as a player in 1967 and 1968. He coached Victorian State teams, winning the Goodall Cup a further five times in succession, 1972 to '76. He did that with a core of 15 players who had played 3 or more of the 5 wins: Grove Bennett, Jim Christie, Gary Croft, Sandy Gardner, Glen Gilbert, Charlie Grandy, Jim Hannah, Barry Harkin (G), Malcolm Heath, Ian Holmes, John Horsnell, Fraser McDonald, Russell Poste, Rob Stevenson, Anders Wiking (G). A majority of these were expat Canadians or Europeans and 28 others were interspersed for 1 or 2 Cups, 4 or 5 new players each series.

Victoria had done this once before in the fifties, but not with the one coach. He was appointed Coach of Australia in the World Championships in Grenoble, France in 1974, with manager Bob Blackburn and captain Charles Grandy, and again when they hosted the West German Olympic Team at Ringwood Iceland in Melbourne in 1977.

He initiated the first VIHDC Development Council in Victoria in 1979. As Coaching Director there he was the primary initiator and planner of VIHDC programs for the improvement of players, coaches, referees, off-ice officials and trainers. The program was adopted by the national association and he was subsequently appointed national Coaching Director in 1981. He continued coaching over the next ten years, after which he was appointed Head Coach for Australia's National Youth Team in the Asian-Oceania tournament in Japan in 1992.

He moved to Queensland in 1996, where he coached their State teams in the National Championships and became National Coaching director for a second time in the mid-2000s. A long-standing member and participant in Australian ice hockey for over 40 years, he is a Life member of the Victorian and Queensland associations, and was made a Life Member of Ice Hockey Australia in Sydney on October 18th, 2008.