Despite playing a season-high 13 games in the month of January, the Checkers continued their giving ways with several community appearances and charitable initiatives, including school and youth hockey appearances, a checkers tournament for charity and the annual teddy bear delivery to Presbyterian Hemby Children’s Hospital.
Buffalo Wild Wings was the place to be on Friday, Jan. 13, for the inaugural Checkers with the Checkers charity tournament. More than $5,000 was raised for Hayden’s Hope, a local extension of the Children’s Organ Transplant Association.
Checkers players Michal Jordan, Cedric McNicoll, Bobby Sanguinetti, Jared Staal and Chris Terry dropped by the WBT Holiday on Ice outdoor rink on Jan. 5 to skate with fans and teach them the finer points of skating.
On Monday, Jan. 16, Mike Murphy, Michal Jordan, Chris Durno, Mathieu Roy and Jon Matsumoto visited Presbyterian Hemby Children’s Hospital to deliver teddy bears to the kids. More than 3,200 teddy bears were collected at the Checkers’ annual Teddy Bear Toss on Dec. 4.
Checkers defensemen Rasmus Rissanen and Justin Krueger, who are becoming regulars at youth hockey practices, dropped in at Extreme Ice Center to help the kids with skills and drills on Tuesday, Jan. 10.
Checkers players and Chubby made several school visits throughout the month of January, including one to Druid Hills Academy on Jan. 10 (Pistilli, Shugg) as part of the Checkers’ Science of Hockey program and another to Oaklawn Elementary on Jan. 13 (Nash, Rissanen) as part of Wells Fargo’s Reading First program.
This Community update is brought to you by Goodrich Corporation, who is a proud sponsor of all Checkers community initiatives. Goodrich Corporation, a Fortune 500 company, is a global supplier of systems and services to the aerospace, defense and homeland security markets. With 2007 revenues of $6.4 billion, Goodrich is headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., and employs more than 24,000 people worldwide in approximately 90 facilities across 16 countries.
