Lorie Kane is one of the latest inductees for Canada’s Sport Hall of Fame.
Kane, a four-time winner on the LPGA Tour, was announced alongside star Canadian athletes from multiple sports including a handful of Olympians, basketball superstar Steve Nash, and Willie O’Ree – the first black player in the NHL, as part of the 11-person class of 2020.
“Utter shock,” Kane said of her feeling when she got the call back in March. “I thought, wow, I love what I do and I’m going to continue to do it, but to be placed in Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame has made me reflect on my career. It’s something I don’t do very often.
“It’s a true honour. The class of athletes and builders that have been inducted for 2020… I’m fans of and have been fans of in this great country of ours.”
Kane, of Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, won all four of her LPGA Tour titles in a seven-month stretch from August 2000 to February 2001. She won three times in 2000 alone and was named The Canadian Press Female Athlete of the Year award that year.
Her career also featured eight top-10’s in majors and five Legends Tour wins since 2011.
Off the course Kane has also received numerous honours.
She is a member of the Canadian Golf Hall of Fame (she was inducted in 2016) and in 2006 she received the Order of Canada, the highest honour a civilian in the country can receive.
Due to the Coronavirus pandemic the ceremony for the inductees will take place in 2021.
“In these uncertain times, we are thrilled to be able to share a good news story and to have this remarkable group of people to induct into Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame next year,” Cheryl Bernard, President and CEO of Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame, said in a press release. “We’ve never been more proud of our sports history, our sports champions, and their community spirit, and we are formally recognizing these athletes and builders for living and sharing sports values – Canada’s shared values; respect, equality, fairness and openness.”
Kane has also been instrumental in helping grow golf for women and young girls in Canada. Golf Town athlete Brooke Henderson has said in the past Kane was someone she looked up to growing up!
Kane said without being introduced to sport she wouldn’t be where she is right now and she’s hopeful her induction into Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame will be another catalyst for women to take up golf, and shine a light on the importance of sport in people’s lives.
“Sport helped me since I wasn’t very academically gifted so it got me through a period of my life where I wasn’t always the smiling person on the inside. I did fear school. But once I got on a playing field I felt normal and maybe more than normal because I was really good at it. My Dad introduced me to golf and he believed God gave me a gift but he had to push me hard,” said Kane.
“[Sports] shows us that anything is possible. We’ve come from behind to win gold medals in Olympic hockey. We’ve won Green Jackets. I’ve got some wins, yes, but more important I’m hoping that, as my parents told me, to leave it better than I found it.”