Ed Chynoweth

Ed Chynoweth (December 14, 1941 – April 22, 2008) was a Canadian ice hockey executive who spent more than two decades as president of both the Western Hockey League and the Canadian Hockey League. The Canadian Press described him as one of the most influential figures in Canadian junior hockey. He also served as a league director and owned a team.

Chynoweth became the WHL’s first full-time president in 1972 and held that role until 1995, with a short break in 1979–80 when he worked as general manager of the Calgary Wranglers. He helped create the CHL in 1972, uniting Canada’s three major junior leagues under one organization, and served as its president from 1975 to 1995. Ontario Hockey League commissioner David Branch called him “the architect of the Canadian Hockey League as we know it today.” In 1995, he left those posts to start the expansion Edmonton Ice, and he remained the team’s president and governor after it moved to become the Kootenay Ice, also serving as the WHL’s chairman of the board until his death.

Chynoweth was married to Linda and had two sons. Dean Chynoweth played in the NHL and later coached the Lake Erie Monsters; Jeff Chynoweth was general manager of the Calgary Hitmen. Chynoweth died of kidney cancer in Calgary at age 66.

He was elected to the Alberta Sports Hall of Fame in 2000. In 2007, the WHL renamed its championship trophy the Ed Chynoweth Cup in his honor. The Ed Chynoweth Trophy, given to the Memorial Cup’s top scorer, also bears his name. He served on the Hockey Hall of Fame’s selection committee and was posthumously inducted as a builder into the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto on November 10, 2008.