Rival Teams Bond Together Against Childhood Cancer [VIDEO]

STONINGTON, CT — Most high school sports stories in mid-May center around battles for league titles, or qualifying for postseason state tournaments. Tuesday's softball matchup between Eastern Connecticut Conference rivals Waterford and Stonington, however, was centered on an issue of far greater importance than the actual outcome on the diamond.

For the 10th straight year, the Lancers and Bears conducted their second meeting of the season as a Play4TheCure benefit to combat childhood cancer. As competitive as the two teams are battling each other on the field, they are equally joined as one in their efforts to raise funds and awareness of this terrible disease.

The benefit game kicked off in 2010, after Waterford coach Liz Sutman and Stonington coach Ann-Marie Houle discovered they had each lost a sibling to cancer. Sutman's 9-year-old niece, Marissa Walker, had also been recently diagnosed with osteosarcoma.

Walker survived her cancer battle and went on to play softball at Waterford, eventually pitching in the benefit game in her senior season under head coach Andy Walker, her uncle. She recently completed her freshman year at the University of Miami, and was in attendance Tuesday, throwing the last of the ceremonial first pitches prior to the contest.

"The event I believe is one that truly brings communities together," Houle said. "On the surface is a game that hopes to raise money for awareness, but I also believe there are so many other parts that inspire me. It is an opportunity to have families that have gone through the same journey meet each other and grow their support system. It is a chance to celebrate those that have beaten the disease, but also remind the families who have sadly lost someone that their loved ones will never be forgotten."

Reflecting on the game's first decade, ceremony emcee Amy Arruda said, "Today's game shows us all that when we come together as a community, we are stronger. When we look across this field and see our family, friends and neighbors who have been impacted by cancer, we can pull together to offer love and support and let them know we are here for them as they battle this disease. And when the unthinkable happens, and we lose someone to cancer, we can do everything we can to keep their memory alive and support our families in real ways."

Arruda said more than $11,000 has been raised since the game's inception, then introduced family members of area youths who have passed away from cancer, as well as a young survivor.

• The family of Lisa Wentz Day, a two-sport standout and 1988 Stonington graduate who passed away in 1990, and for whom a scholarship is named;
• Theresa Pont, an eighth-grader at Mystic Middle School who was diagnosed with brain cancer as a kindergarten student and is now an active participant in her school's Unified Sports program;
• The family of Aimee Reed, a Stonington softball player from 1998 to 2001 who passed away from breast cancer in 2018;
• The family of Sullivan Schrader, a first-grade student at Ledyard Center School who died in 2018, and whose family started a nonprofit organization called Sullivan's Toy Run;
• The family and best friends of Madeline Guarraia of East Lyme, a fourth-grader and founder of Animal Rescue Rangers, whose passion for tigers inspired her motto, "ROAR" (which adorned the outfield fence Tuesday); she died in 2016.

Stonington's players each wore face paint bearing a gold ribbon and the motto, "No One Fights Alone," while players on both squads wore custom shirts stating, "Fight Childhood Cancer."

A memorial wall with pictures and stories of loved ones lost to cancer was displayed on the side of the third base dugout. Nearly 100 paper softballs were purchased and adorned with the names of those battling or have battled the disease.

The efforts of the two programs to establish and maintain this fundraising tradition was recently recognized with the presentation of the Hal Levy High School Achievement Award by the Connecticut Sports Writers' Alliance at the 78th Gold Key Dinner on April 28.

Incidentally, following the tears and gestures of love and support, a game was played, with a two-run single by Waterford's Lili Stoddard breaking a 2-2 tie and paving the way to a 6-2 victory for the Lancers. However, in the overall scheme of things, that hardly seemed significant. As Arruda said at the start of the ceremony, "The goal then, and the goal still today, is to teach our players that life is more than just a game."

(Tim Jensen/Patch Media Corp.)