NEWS PHOTO JAMES TUBB
Medicine Hat Tigers defenceman Jonas Woo skates to the bench to celebrate his first period goal in a 6-0 win March 10 at Co-op Place over the Regina Pats.
jtubb@medicinehatnews.com@ReporterTubb
Already entrenched as a WHL champion in Medicine Hat, Jonas Woo’s legacy will forever be written in Tigers history.
The 19-year-old Winnipeg product holds the franchise record for points in a single season by a defenceman, passing Cliff Lane’s mark of 82 points from 1975-76. Woo had a goal and an assist in Friday’s 6-3 win in Lethbridge over the Hurricanes, breaking the record with his third-period goal.
Woo says the record isn’t something he was thinking of at the start of the year, but he’s proud to be able to hold it.
“To look back at it in the future, and it was cool that he reached out to me, obviously I couldn’t have done it with all my teammates and (Bryce) Pickford by my side,” Woo said. “Definitely all those guys helped me out.”
Lane reached out to Woo with a letter, congratulating the Tigers defenceman on breaking his 50-year-old record.
“I’m thrilled for you and the Tigers to have you break my 50-year-old record for a Tigers defenceman, I hope you completely smash it over the last few games of the season, I think you will have to with Bryce on your tail,” said Lane in the letter read by Woo in a social media post.
Woo was honoured to hear from Lane after breaking the record, it’s a show of support he plans to also do whenever his record is broken.
“Everyone here talks about him, he’s on the wall, we see him every day when we walk in, so being in the category of him is pretty special and him reaching out was really cool, I got to tell my family and friends about that,” Woo said.
“I want whoever plays as a Tiger to beat my record, that’s their job and I hope it happens when I’m able to reach out to them.”
Woo leads all CHL defencemen with 84 points, adding 28 goals in 55 games. Him breaking the record is well deserved, head coach Willie Desjardins said.
“He’s such a good player,” Desjardins said. “He has so much skill, lots of heart, he plays hard and it doesn’t matter who he’s playing against. He’s been such a great player for us.”
Desjardins played against Lane in 1975-76 as a member of the Lethbridge Broncos, he remembers facing off against the former record holder.
“He was good, he competed hard, he had really good skill,” Desjardins said. “He was a guy with great skill, so it was a long time for that record to stand though.”
As touched as Woo was by Lane reaching out, it meant just as much to Desjardins and it reestablished what he already knew about the culture of the Tigers franchise.
“The team has a great history, The Masers have been unbelievable and it says a lot when you have one ownership through all those years,” Desjardins said. “It’s great that players still the team.”
Woo’s record 84 points is two ahead of his D-partner Pickford, who is tied with Lane’s tally of 82. The Tigers captain holds the franchise record for goals in a single season by a defenceman with 44, after he passed Kris Russell’s 2006-07 record of 32 in January. Woo says it’s fitting they both hold a record and he hopes they will be able to continue sharing the honours years down the road.
“He works really hard every day, and it’s cool, deserves that record,” Woo said. “We get to share that and it’s pretty special. Maybe in the future we can reconnect and look back and it’d be pretty cool.”
