Night of Hope at Sidney High to benefit cancer patients

Feb. 15 will be a night at Sidney High School devoted to basketball and supporting The Night of Hope Foundation, a foundation dedicated to helping local cancer patients.

Pink Out Sidney Lady Raider t-shirts are being sold at the school for $15 per short sleeve shirt.

All shirt proceeds will be donated to The Night of Hope Foundation. T-shirt payments and order forms must be returned to the high school office by 3 p.m. Feb. 8 to receive them before the game. For any questions concerning t-shirts or Feb. 15 events call 308-254-5893. Money must be paid in advance to getting the shirt and if someone still wants to order a shirt late the latest deadline will be Feb. 12 at 3 p.m.

T-shirts can be ordered online at Sidneyraiders.org or http://www.nightofhope.com or order forms are in the high school office.

“For every dollar that they raise for Night of Hope we are able to help that many more cancer patients,” said Brenda Noel, president of The Night of Hope Foundation.

However fundraising for Night of Hope does not stop at t-shirts this year. A dinner, silent cake auction and a Points for Pink event will also take place.

Through Points for Pink a person will be able to sponsor money for every free throw shot made during the boys and girls varsity games next Friday night. Feb. 15 at 12 p.m. is the deadline for Points for Pink forms and all sponsors will meet in the commons directly following the varsity boys basketball game to pay. Points for Pink sponsor forms can also be found on the above websites, according to event organizer, Shelby Price, the high school secretary.

Senior basketball player Sam Arterburn said that it will be nice playing Friday night and knowing that he is playing not only for his team and school, but also for a good cause.

“It feels good to play basketball and each point you score people can donate to someone struggling through a thing like breast cancer,” said Arterburn.

“It’s nice to know the better you play the more money that will get raised,” said Lane Harvey, a sophomore basketball player.

The night begins with junior varsity games and dinner starting at 4 p.m. The dinner consists of chicken noodle soup or chili, cinnamon rolls with pink frosting and a drink all for $5. Donations over $5 are also accepted. Parents of students will be making dinner and students will be selling the meals.

Sidney High School’s foods class is also supporting cancer awareness and baking for Pink. The class will be baking and decorating approximately 16 cakes that will be a part of a silent auction bid that closes after halftime of the boys’ varsity game. The cakes are a part of the students’ grades and students’ names will be labeled on the cakes so that parents can come and bid on certain cakes if they wish, said Price.

Price said although the school has held a Pink Out night in previous years this is the first year the fundraising efforts have been so great.

“This is the first night that the high school boys and girls basketball teams have done a fundraiser which benefits The Night of Hope and are gathering to do this big fundraiser,” she said.

The girls junior varsity and varsity basketball teams also held a potluck fundraiser at the beginning of the season and raised approximately $2,000 to purchase pink jerseys for the Feb. 15 games, according to Morgan Linneman, a senior girls’ basketball player.

“Our coach’s wife just got diagnosed with breast cancer last year so it made it kind of a bigger deal to us,” said Linneman.

“That’s why we started this. We started by having a potluck for $7 a dinner and now we want to fundraise more,” said Kylee Price, a senior girls’ basketball player.

Linneman said that her coach Tyler Shaw’s wife’s diagnosis last January is the girls primary drive to play their hearts out next Friday night.

“I think that is kind of what motivated us to raise this money. We are having another potluck that night. It affected everyone once Mandy was diagnosed and made it more personal,” said Linneman.

“It’s nice to know that people in our school are participating in the stuff that is going on and they know now about our coach and that is pretty cool,” said Price.

All of the money raised through meal sales, the silent cake auction and the Points for Pink event will be donated to The Night of Hope Foundation.

The president of the foundation said that the foundation was started by the community many years ago after the building of the Dorwart Cancer Care Center. The community use to just participate in Relay-for-Life activities before the center made cancer a more local issue.

One of the foundation’s biggest fundraising events is The Night of Hope cancer walk event.

Noel said that all money raised stays local for patients battling cancer.

“The walk is the second Friday in August of every year. This year should be the 11th anniversary of the foundation,” said Noel. “We have it in the park around the pond. We sell luminaries that we light up and we line the pond with them and watch those at dusk. We also have a slide show that we do at the end.”

The president said that every year the event kicks off with a survivor lap.

“That’s the most important thing that we do,” she said. “It’s to honor those that are still fighting the big fight and staying strong.”

Noel said that the support the high school teams are giving the foundation is greatly appreciated.

“It’s very heartwarming to see the young people in our community support The Night of Hope as strongly as they do every year. Cancer awareness hits everybody of all ages,” she said. “I’m not so sure that they fully understand the impact that they make.”

This year The Night of Hope walk will be held Aug. 9 and preparations for the event will soon by underway by the foundation, said Noel.