At the Diamond Alumni Centre last Monday, SFU Athletics named six athletes, one coach, one builder, and one team to the Athletics Hall of Fame.
Eugene Gyorfi (swimming and diving), Jim Jardine (football), Sara Maglio (soccer), Andrea Schnider (basketball), Ed Sernoski (wrestling), and Harold Willers (track and field) were the athletes inducted.
Former men’s basketball coach Stan Stewardson, trainer Jack Taunton, and the 2001-02 women’s basketball team were also inducted.
Gyorfi, already an established swimmer before joining the Clan in 1981, led SFU to the 1983 NAIA team championship, while earning three individual titles of his own that year. In 1984, he earned another three, making him one of SFU’s most decorated swimmers ever.
Jardine was with SFU’s football team at its inception, recruited by the Clan’s founding athletic director, Lorne Davies, who was on hand at the ceremony as well. Despite being brought in as quarterback, Jardine switched to defensiveback where he’d anchor the Clan’s secondary throughout his college career. The Clan’s original Minister of Defence became a BC provincial court judge after graduation.
Sara Maglio, named an NAIA All-American four times, was a star in her time with the Clan. She won a national title in 1996 while leading the team in scoring. Maglio would join the Canadian national team, playing in the 1999 FIFA Women’s World Cup.
Schnider, who played for renowned head coach Alison McNeil from 1988 to 1992, was a two-time All-American from 1991 to 1992. She was also on the first Clan squad to qualify for the NAIA Championships, and is still the NAIA all-time assists leader with 926.
Ed Sernoski won two NAIA wrestling titles in 1986 and 1988 at 150 lbs. He also earned a team championship in 1988, a year for which he holds the Clan single-season win-loss record, with a dominant 73–3 season. He went on to become the Canadian champion at 74 kg, and represented Canada in the 1989 World Championships.
From 1978 to 1980, Willers was a three-time NAIA champion in the hammer throw, and continued his collegiate success after graduating, winning four Canadian Championships in the event from 1981 to 1984.
Coach Stewardson led the SFU men’s basketball program for nine seasons, from 1975 to 1979 and again from 1984 to 1989. He groomed some of Canada’s best talent, including Terry Fox and Jay Triano, two other Clan Hall of Famers. He is also a recipient of the Metro Vancouver Basketball Foundation’s Lifetime Achievement Award and has been inducted into the Basketball BC Hall of Fame as well.
Dr. Jack Taunton began his sports medicine career at SFU, serving on the Clan’s medical staff. Since then, his career has grown immensely and he served as Chief Medical Officer for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games. With Taunton at the helm, the event was named by the IOC as the best sport medicine platform in Olympic history.
The 2001-02 women’s basketball team were SFU’s first Canadian Interuniversity Sport Champions. The Clan racked up 35 wins on the year, and went the full season without a single loss. The team was named the Basketball BC and Sport BC Team of the Year that season and was later elected into the Burnaby Sports Hall of Fame.
Meanwhile, the late Tim Jones became the first inductee of the Terry Fox Honorary Inductee category since Fox himself. Jones died suddenly in January of this year, but was the volunteer team leader of North Shore Rescue (NSR), a Vancouver-based search and rescue operation, and was also the paramedic in charge with the BC Ambulance Service. Jones raised over $1 million for NSR, and served with NSR and BC Ambulance Service for over 30 years. His son Curtis accepted the award on his behalf.
