Hugh Boyd Trojans football team dedicated one of its biggest wins in recent memory to a former student who tragically lost his life in a single vehicle accident a week earlier.
Simon Johal, 20, was working as a cab driver on Oct. 14 when he lost control of his car on the Barnet Highway near the Port Moody/Burnaby boundary. He graduated from Hugh Boyd Secondary in 2014 and played football at the West Richmond school for all five years. His funeral was held on Saturday and attended by his former coaches and teammates.
"We lost one of our kids. Simon was a happy go lucky kid,” said Trojans head coach Bill Haddow. “We called him ‘Smiles’ because he had a smile on his face all the time. The last couple of years, all he talked about was getting his cab license. That’s all he wanted to do.
“We dedicated this game to him and rallied around that a bit. Most of the (current players) knew him. In Grades 7-9, they all look up to the senior kids.”
