Willie de Wit

Background

DeWit played football in high school and was an all-star quarterback. He was offered a scholarship to the University of Alberta, but decided to quit football after growing tired of team sports after losing patience with his high school teammates. He began going to a Grande Prairie health club, which was run by a man named Jim Murrie. At the time, deWit's father Len was terminally ill with a brain tumor so Willie started hitting the heavy bags to stay out of the house and to stay in shape. Impressed with his dedication and size, Murrie introduced deWit to Dr. Harry Snatic, a dentist and rancher who had been a youth boxing coach in Louisiana before moving his family in 1971 to Beaverlodge, a small town near Grande Prairie. He worked out with deWit three times a week, first in the health club, until it went out of business a short time later, and then in the deWit's unheated garage where temperatures would often get to 10 or 20 degrees below zero.

DeWit's first fight came at the Alberta provincial championships, in March 1979 in Medicine Hat. Snatic entered deWit in the light heavyweight intermediate novice division for boxers age 17 to 20 with less than 10 fights. DeWit knocked out his first opponent in 20 seconds—which caused the coaches of the six other fighters in the division to pull their fighters. DeWit had won his first championship. Snatic then entered Willie in the British Columbia Golden Glove championships. where he fought 18-year-old Shane Anderson who was the western Canadian 178-pound champion and a veteran of about 40 fights. DeWit lost by decision. But he did beat Anderson in two of three return matches. In the last of those bouts, deWit knocked out Anderson, who never fought again.

Snatic then took Willie to fight at the Washington State Penitentiary where he knocked out his opponent in the opening minute of the first round, nearly causing a prison riot. Afterwards in April 1982 Snatic decided to sell his ranch and moved to Calgary. deWit went with him in order to find sparring partners, and to train with a Ugandan exile named Mansoor Esmail, who was Calgary's top boxing coach, and was considered a physical-conditioning genius.

Willie's first major victory came in Las Vegas in June 1982 when he knocked out Cuba's Pedro Cardenas to win his first North American title. Then he won gold at the Commonwealth Games; it took him a total of three minutes and 12 seconds to knock out three opponents. In March 1983 he defeated Aleksandr Yagubkin of the U.S.S.R. to win the world title. Then in September 1983 he defended his North American title against highly touted Cuban Aurelio Toyo. DeWit was not perfect, however, losing a decision to Arnold Vanderlyde in January 1983.

Leading up to the 1984 Olympics, a benefit in Calgary starring boxing fan Ryan O'Neal and Farrah Fawcett raised $70,000 to finance Willie's training. At this point Snatic began importing professional sparring partners from the United States.

Olympics

At the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics deWit lost the gold medal match to Henry Tillman of the United States. Heading into the games, deWit and fellow Canadian Shawn O' Sullivan were considered favorites, especially by Canadians who fully expected deWit to win the gold. DeWit felt the pressure and says that he does not have many good memories of the games.

Pro career and later life

Tabbed early as a "Great White Hope", deWit turned professional immediately after the Olympics and was persuaded by a contract offer reportedly worth $5 million, began to train and fight out of Burnet, Texas. He then defeated Ken Lakusta to capture the Canadian heavyweight championship.

DeWit had an otherwise uneventful pro career, and was knocked down four times in a second-round TKO loss to Bert Cooper in 1987. The loss to Cooper was deWit's only career defeat, as he retired after six consecutive wins, the last of which being a unanimous decision victory over Henry Tillman.

After announcing his retirement he started a concrete surfacing company in California, which he eventually left to return to Canada. A friend of his who was a judge, suggested he get an education and become a lawyer. DeWit returned to school and graduated from the University of Alberta in 1994 with a law degree. He articled to the Alberta Court of Appeal and the civil law firm of Howard Mackie and was called to the Alberta Bar in September 1995. After practising with Howard Mackie, deWit joined the criminal defence firm of Evans Martin Wilson (now Wolch deWit Watts & Wilson) in 1996. He remains with the firm to this day, and is its longest standing member. He was appointed Queen's Counsel (Q.C.) in 2013 and is the former president of the Canadian Bar Association Criminal Law subsection.

In 1995 deWit was inducted into the Alberta Sports Hall of Fame. He also has a street named after him in Grande Prairie, Alberta.

In 2012, deWit made a cameo appearance in the Calgary-based Souls in Rhythm band's musical video Another Round (featuring hop-hop artist Transit).

In 2017, deWit was appointed as a judge to the Court of Queen's Bench of Alberta. He sits in Calgary.