A man who improved hundreds of kids’ lives through hockey died in a crash on I-80 Saturday west of Anita, Iowa.
That wreck killed three and injured several others.
Sunday KMTV learns of the longstanding impact youth hockey coach Shayne Sanborn made on those who knew him best.
Omaha AAA Youth Hockey Coach Sanborn is described as a brother, mentor and friend to everyone we talked with.
Everywhere he went, Sanborn changed lives.
"He’s rare,” said Sanborn’s Fiancé Molley Howell. “I wish you could talk to all the people in this room. There are 30 people in this room who all got to feel his love."
The love of Coach Sanborn so strong, the few years he spent with his fiancé’s family made an extended family whose bond will never be broken.
"There's no way any of us are going to be able to erase the memory of him or forget the things that he's taught us,” Howell said. “All our hearts are filled with love because of him."
Sanborn was a person who easily made a lifelong impact on nearly everyone he met, Howell said.
"Everyone in the hockey program, there's over 1,000 kids playing in the hockey program here in Omaha,” she said. “He's touched every single one of their lives."
AAA Hockey player Jacob Eshelman says Sanborn was much more than a great coach.
“A second father,” Eshelman said. “He shaped me into the man or the young man that I am today. He's helped me go through a divorce with my parents. He was always there when I needed him. I'll never forgive him for that."
Howell and Sanborn were supposed to get married this summer and had just moved into the home they had built two months ago.
"We just had family pictures taken, had our first Christmas cards together, shot and sent out,” Howell said. “A lot of dreams have been broken."
Howell says she knows Shayne is watching over them.
"He’d want us to move on,” she said. “He'd want us to be happy. He would want us to get along and love one another and definitely wants the kids to play hockey.”
There’s a GoFundMe pageset up for the family.
