Patience and Commitment pays off for Vice President

Aaron Somerville has been a core member of the Hockey House community since it's inception, the current Hockey House Vice President , and  GM of Les Phoques (Seals) has finally become the top club in the countries premier recreational ice hockey competition & Big"A" is now a Backyard Cup Champion.

Patience is an understatement ...

The 2013 Inaugural Season of the BHL saw Somerville forego playing to become the league's first Referee. He watched Les Pylones be crowned the 1st BHL Champions.

To Begin the 2014-15 season, Aaron was awarded the GM position for the first of two expansion teams and began his chase for the silver chalice. The opening season for the Seals did not go so well and he was again behing the whistle and forced to watch as the other expansion team the Toe Dragon's won the BHL's biggest prize in thier first season.

The 2015-16 campaign was another ON Ice disappointment as Les Phoques finished last and were eliminated in the BHL Wildcard Round by the eventual Champions, Les Castors. This was also the year Somerville began the position of Vice President of Hockey House Operations, and the same year that he joined Punchy as the voices of the West Auckland Admirals, two positions he currently still holds.

The 2016-17 version of Les Phoques was impressive as the franchise began to turn the corner upon the arrival of thier feeder club in the FHL. The end result was the clubs first Founder's Cup win as the BHL's top regular season team. The Seals appeared in thier first Backyard Cup Final but lost in a deciding 5th game to the Iceholes.

2017-18 marked the RESET year in which all 6 BHL /FHL Franchises started anew ... Somerville did his homework ... and chose some of the building blocks in which the franchise would stand for the next 4 years. The choices landed him the title of the Inaugural CHOHOHO Champions & a 2nd straight Founder's Cup. The postseason saw them fall short as they were eliminated by Les Castors who were then on the recieving end of the BHL's first Finals sweep by Top Cheese.

Finally this past summer, began an upsetting one for the Seals, as they finished 5th in the regular season and simply couldn't seem to find any consistency in thier game. Following the Christmas break and a big deadline trade the Seals began to morph into a contender. The club started the playoffs 2-1 in the Wildcard Round before having to sit on the edge of thier seats in hopes for a bigtime Toe Dragons performance in order to advance to the Conference Final. Their prayers were answered and a faceoff with Les Castors the 2nd ranked seed commenced. After losing the first game of the Conference Final, Les Phoques became unstoppable, dispatching of the Beavers in four games before advancing to thier 2nd BHL Final and taking the series 3-1 over the Founder's Cup winners &  defending Champion, Top Cheese.

After 6 years of commitment and dedication to the Hockey House, to his teammates, to the entire BHL community and to the game itself, after all his hard work ... Finally .... Aaron Somerville heard his name called to become the 6th captain of the 6th team in 6 years to accept the Backyard Cup !!!

Congrats Buddy & Thank - You for the storybook ending to Season 6 !!!