NORWICH – For a third straight year, Norwich High School athletes, students, cheerleaders and coaches are coming together to fight cancer, beginning with Friday night’s varsity football game versus defending class A state champions Maine-Endwell.
During the game, members of the NHS football team and cheerleading squad will show their support by donning pink, the traditional color for breast cancer awareness, according to NHS Varsity Cheerleading Coach Marie DeSarro. Additional sports teams – throughout the fall – will also participate, she added, with athletes sporting various colors representing different types of cancer.
“The ‘pink game’ has become more and more successful over the past three years, and every year teams are finding new ways to show their support and raise awareness in the fight against cancer,” said DeSarro. “Our goal, looking forward, is to have all teams participate in some way.”
In the future, DeSarro said she’d like to hold some type of fundraiser, one held in concert with the now-annual breast cancer awareness game, which is typically held the first Friday in October. For now, however, each team participates in its own way. On Friday, the football team will be wearing pink ribbon stickers on their helmets, while the cheerleaders will once again don their “Cheer For A Cure” uniforms. The cheerleading booster club will also be pitching in, selling pink and blue cancer awareness T-shirts, as well as various other items. Donations will be collected throughout the evening, with all proceeds benefitting the cheerleaders’ 2013 Relay For Life team.
According to DeSarro, the past three years have seen an increase in participation by the school’s athletes and coaches, and she’s hoping to include all students in the future. This year, the NHS Marching Band has joined the cause, and its members will wear pink ribbons as part of their uniform.
The Cheer For A Cure Relay For Life team – made up of current, former and future NHS cheerleaders and their families – added DeSarro, raised nearly $4,000 for the 2012 Relay, as a first year team, no less.
“Many of those donations came to us as a result of last year’s ‘pink game,’” said DeSarro, “as well as our Coaches vs. Cancer basketball games. I can’t tell you how proud I was of these girls at Relay last year. They put together their own campsite, decorated to the theme of Fairy Tales, participated in all the themed laps, and organized on-site fundraisers to continue to raise money. I can only see them raising more for the 2013 event.”
