Longtime Belleville hockey fans share community connections between Senators and Bulls

For Elwood Lebow, hockey games at CAA Arena have always been a family affair.

“I always knew where my kids were on Wednesday and Saturday nights,” joked the 34-year season ticket holder for the OHL’s Belleville Bulls.

Not only has he cheered on Belleville’s junior, and now professional, hockey squads from his domain in Section 116, but Lebow also travelled with the Bulls as their bus driver for four seasons.

“That was like a dream come true,” he recalls. “It was quite the experience, because you got to go wherever they played, and back in those days Larry Mavety was the coach; he treated me really well.”

“If the boys were eating two quarter-pounders after a game, they’d give one to me – even though I didn’t do nothin’ but drive them there!”

He fondly remembers the Bulls 1999 championship run and the stellar play of future NHLer Jonathan Cheechoo. But to him, the franchise truly began its ascent in the late 1980s, when longtime NHLer Bryan Marchment patrolled the blue line.

“I remember when he was drafted as a 16-year old to the Bulls,” Lebow recounts. “I’ll swear to this day that he was the best open ice hitter that there’s ever been on that ice surface.”

After cheering on the Bulls for every season of the franchise’s OHL tenure, he now counts himself as one of many day-one season ticket holders for the city’s AHL successor.

“We had a little cry when the Bulls left,” he admits, “but when we found out the Senators were coming, we decided to get four season tickets, and we’ve thoroughly enjoyed it; now I get to bring my grandchildren with me.”

Lebow uses his season tickets to give many others an opportunity to see games, from customers at the Stirling Arena canteen he operates, to family and church members.

His kids whom he once brought to games now have their own season tickets, one section over.

“It’s a visit every week,” he says of the social element of coming to the arena, “but the quality of hockey is second to none. I have really, really enjoyed these guys.

“You see them one night in Belleville – the next night, they’re on national TV.”

To Lebow, it’s just another chapter in the rich and unique hockey history that Belleville holds.

“The McFarlands put Belleville on the map back in the 1950s, and it’s always been a hockey place,” he noted. “There have been a lot of great NHL players coming from Belleville – we’ve got one right now [Nick Cousins] with the Ottawa Senators; that says a lot about what our minor hockey system is producing.”

But he’s still waiting for one more memorable story to be told.

“We’ve really enjoyed the Senators – I just want them to go all the way and win the Calder Cup some day.”