Bayern Munich's Alphonso Davies and Super Bowl winner Laurent Duvernay-Tardif, who skipped the 2020 NFL season to work on the front line of the COVID-19 pandemic, were named co-winners of the Lou Marsh Trophy for Canada's athlete of the year on Tuesday.
A panel of sports journalists from across the country voted on the award, which is named after a former Toronto Star sports editor, with Davies and Duvernay-Tardif each receiving 18 votes.
The other finalists were Jamal Murray of the NBA's Denver Nuggets and soccer players Christine Sinclair and Kadeisha Buchanan.
Davies, a 20-year-old left back, won five trophies with his German club during a stellar year in which he became the first Canadian to win a Champions League men's title.
"I am truly honoured and humbled to have been selected as the co-winner for the 2020 Lou Marsh Trophy,” Davies, who was born in a refugee camp in Ghana and moved to Canada when he was five, said in a Canada Soccer news release.
"Canada welcomed me and my family and I am grateful for the opportunity to realize my dream of being a professional football player and representing Canada on the world stage."
Duvernay-Tardif, a medical school graduate, won a Super Bowl in February as the starting right guard with the Kansas City Chiefs and in July announced he would sit out a season in favour of working as an orderly at a long-term care facility.
"Humbled to win the Lou Marsh Award with @AlphonsoDavies one of the greatest athletes Canada has ever produced," Duvernay-Tardif wrote on Twitter.
(Reporting by Frank Pingue in Toronto; editing by Clare Fallon)
