The Eastern Michigan softball team held its third annual cornhole tournament Friday in support of fundraising for the American Cancer Society.
“Knock Cancer out of the Park” took place just outside right field at the softball team’s Varsity Field.
Jessica Richards, an senior infielder who helped make the event a success said she thinks the event went very well.
“There was a great turn out,” Richards said. “I think everyone had a lot of fun.”
She said that everyone received rubber bracelets that had the words, “Knock Cancer out of the Park” on them and were given out to 60 to 70 people that attended.
“We have been doing this event for a couple of years now,” Richards said. “We passed out flyers and used Facebook to advertise the event.”
The winners were Mike and Phil; the runner-ups were Joe Polser and Chad Luckie.
Polser and Luckie, who are juniors at EMU, said they came out to the event to support breast cancer awareness and support EMU softball.
“We played last year; we were the returning champs,” Polser said. “But this year we couldn’t get it done.”
Sarah Gerber, another softball senior who helped facilitate the event, said that 28 teams participated in the event.
“Most were athletes, friends from athletes; others were family members from the team, and groups of people from the community,” Gerber said.
Local businesses chipped in as well, offering gift cards to the winners and provided food for the event. Benito’s Pizza was one of the local businesses that offered food to the event.
Aubree’s, a local restaurant and Exotic Shades, a local tanning business donated gift cards to the event, as well.
Gerber said: “We started planning this event in the summer pretty much. We kept on putting it together through this past month. We’ve had a lot of players that have had family members that have had cancer impact their lives’ in some way, so we decided to donate to the American Cancer Society.”
Gerber said she thinks they had a bigger turnout this year than last year’s “Knock Cancer Out of the Park.”
“The event went a lot better than planned; it went smoothly with no real complications,” Gerber said.
She said the earnings for the day totaled close to $400 profit after awarding Phil and Mike their trophy and gift cards.
