On A Positive Note: Drop the Puck on Cancer shows no one fights alone

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — A bunch of mates within the South Hills has got down to maintain their mates’ legacies alive.

The annual Drop the Puck on Most cancers occasion is Saturday, and KDKA-TV’s Kym Gable has the story behind it.

Matt Harkins’ basement is bursting with baskets, sports activities memorabilia and dedication to a trigger he holds so very pricey.

“It is a fundraiser like none you may ever go to,” mentioned Harkins, who’s on the board of administrators for Drop the Puck on Most cancers.

He is speaking concerning the Drop the Puck on Most cancers hockey event in Brentwood. All of it started in 2012 after Tom Cavateo and Julie Andrulonis Duttine died after battling the illness.

Their mates needed to memorialize them and assist their relations. At first, the objective was small. 

“Increase a few hundred {dollars},” Harkins mentioned. “Effectively, it snowballed and we raised $40,000 the primary yr. We thought we had been one and finished.”

Twelve years later, it is a registered non-profit group that has raised greater than $800,000. The occasion has additionally advanced into an all-day, 12-team double-elimination extravaganza.

Brentwood graduates, courting again to the ’70s, donate class baskets yearly.

“The presents and the assistance are wonderful,” mentioned Shannan Mitchell, a previous recipient. “They’ve touched so many individuals’s lives serving to them by means of their journey”

On this group, nobody fights alone.

“To see it evolve every year and it retains getting larger and greater, it is actually stunning,” volunteer Hannah Mitchell mentioned.

It is a marketing campaign that extends past simply Brentwood.

“If extra folks did what we had been doing, the world might simply change,” mentioned Taryn Frey, who’s on the board of administrators. “It may very well be a greater place.”