Soccer rivals change their colors for meaningful causes
DOVER – Saturday’s New Philadelphia-Dover soccer games are not going to look like the traditional clash of red and black versus crimson and gray.
Instead, New Philadelphia will wear orange, and Dover will wear teal and purple as the players highlight causes close to them and the communities.
The Rivals for a Cause tradition began several years ago, with the teams donning pink uniforms for October’s breast cancer awareness month. Since then, they’ve switched to other colors as tragic circumstances brought other causes to the forefront.
This year, Dover’s teal and purple represent mental health awareness and suicide prevention as the team remembers Nathan Beachy and supports his family.
New Philadelphia Girls Soccer Coach Chad Roberts says the Quakers will wear orange to represent leukemia as the community rallies around recent grad Boston Crowell and his cancer battle.
“We wanted to stand behind him and help him and his family in the coming months as they begin this journey,” Roberts said. “Then with the recent loss of Nathan from Dover, we all as a community want to support him and his family. Obviously, he has his ties to the Dover soccer program in Dover schools, and, his mother is an employee at New Phila schools and has had many of my players and the high school boys players. So we want to rally behind their entire family as well.”
Dover boys soccer team mom Karla Burrier says there are several opportunities for the community to join the causes.
There will be several raffle baskets from generous local businesses and individuals, including a bourbon basket, a sports basket with Columbus Crew tickets, baskets from local wineries and other venues, a relaxation package, and more. Proceeds will go to the Beachy family.
Proceeds from a 50/50 raffle and concession stand will go to Boston Crowell.
And a Wendy’s fundraiser on Wednesday helped Warriors Boutique, which makes wigs for cancer patients.
“They’re really good causes, and we hope a lot of people come out to support these boys and girls,” Burrier said. “They are supporting each other. It’s wonderful to see. It’s such a tragedy, but it’s wonderful for these kids to pull together and really support each other.”
The New Philadelphia-Dover boys game is at 5 p.m. on Saturday and the girls play at 7 at Crater Stadium in Dover.
