Photos: Joe Pritchard Memorial Game

This past Saturday night the NYPD Finest Football Team played a game in memory of Joe Pritchard, the NYPD officer and North Babylon resident who lost his life tragically in a March 25 crash on the Long Island Expressway.

The team, on which Pritchard played, took on the Long Island Panthers on at the Lindenhurst Middle School Field. But before the game Pritchard's team number, #1, was retired.

The game also raised money for a scholarship that was started in Pritchard's name that will be given by the Lindenhurst Touchdown Club. T-shirts were sold at the game for the same purpose, and a website was to be set up this week - though details about exactly when that'll occur weren't available yet.

At the end of the April 6 event, the game ball was given to Pritchard's mother, Maryann.

In addition to the memorial game, the Class of 2001 Peer Leadership Class, of which Pritchard, a Lindenhurst High School alum, was a part, is planning to plant a tree in the courtyard of the LHS in Pritchard's memory, according to Lindenhurst Schools Superintendent Richard Nathan.

"The students involved in that class remained close through the years, and one of them is now a teacher at the high school - Jillian Marx. She came to me with their idea of the tree planting," Nathan told Lindenhurst Patch after the meeting.

There was no word about when the tree planting would take place.