St. Charles North volleyball making difference off the court
St. Charles North volleyball player Taryn Dal Degan said her family rings the bell for the Salvation Army during the holiday season. They make sandwiches for Lazarus House to distribute to people who are hungry.
The senior setter said one of the quotes they like at her National Honor Society meetings is: the best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.
That's a pretty timeworn phrase but the North Stars back it up.
They've got an annual tradition, started four years ago by graduate Alexis Busch, of spending a day with people served by the Marklund Hyde Center in Geneva. Marklund is a nonprofit organization that helps people of all ages who have developmental disabilities. Busch, now a nursing student and defensive specialist at St. Thomas University in Florida, volunteered there and told North Stars coach Lindsey Hawkins about it.
"It's just a fun event for our girls," Hawkins said. "It gives them some perspective for why they play this game, it gives them an appreciation for what they have and the gifts they've been given."
The volleyball team visited Marklund Sept. 27, playing baseball with people there, breaking off with them individually, making friends.
"Seeing their faces light up when you're playing with them or laughing with them is one of the most rewarding experiences, and it's so fun," Dal Degan said.
The girls look forward to this time. Hawkins said this visit was difficult because one person they'd come to know, affectionately called the "Mayor of Marklund," had died since their last visit. Hawkins said the girls dedicated their season to him.
The other part of this tradition has some of their Marklund friends come watch one of their volleyball games. They attended the Oct. 2 match against Waubonsie Valley.
The girls signed volleyballs for them, the junior varsity team hung out with them during the match. Though St. Charles North lost it wasn't for lack of desire or inspiration.
"We definitely wanted to play harder for them, and we dedicated our game to them," Dal Degan said. She said the whole experience brings her "down to earth."
Dal Degan said before she visited Marklund two years ago she didn't realize this opportunity existed. Before the season started, St. Charles North also went to a Build-a-Bear Workshop and will donate their creations to a pediatric cancer patients. As part of the program's Volley for a Cure event on Oct. 13, freshman players will spend time at the LivingWell Cancer Resource Center to better understand of why they're volleying for a cure.
"It's a message I preach to my program," Hawkins said, "is that there's so much more to life than just volleyball, and every chance that they get they should be doing something to use those talents they have for volleyball for good in some way."
Get your kicks off Route 64
St. Charles North hosts St. Charles East in their rivalry football game Oct. 17. That means St. Charles Mayor Ray Rogina, District 303 Superintendent Dr. Donald Schloman and respective high school principals Charles Kyle and Audra Christenson are limbering their hamstrings for the 21st annual Kick-A-Thon.
Both schools' drill teams and coordinators Pam Taylor, Donna Zocher, Donna Roberton and Bonnie Tria-Roy are in final preparations of what has become a year-round effort, planning and fundraising for charity. Last year the 20th anniversary Kick-A-Thon featured a record 165 community kickers and donated a record $100,000 to the LivingWell Cancer Resource Center in Geneva and the American Cancer Society's Fox Valley Chapter.
Kick-A-Thon, started two decades ago by former St. Charles Drill Team coach and St. Charles East Hall of Fame inductee Kari Batka, has donated $778,019.05 to charity.
This summer the drill teams of each high school held a car wash to raise funds, and since then restaurants and stores have chipped in with proceeds from sales and served as collection points for donations. Companies have lined up to provide sponsorships. All the food for the pregame Kick-A-Thon tailgate is being donated as well, Roberton said.
As of Oct. 6, 147 kickers had enlisted to execute their 100 kicks, a 100-yard spectacle stretching from goal line to goal line at St. Charles North. As of Tuesday people were still signing up.
This year a third organization will benefit from the final haul, revealed by the drill teams Dec. 6 at the Crosstown Classic basketball games at St. Charles East. Fox Valley Food for Health, out of Geneva, trains teens about cooking and healthy food, and delivers meals to individuals and families in crisis due to life-threatening illness.
They mean business when they're on the floor, but Roberton said the girls from "both sides of the river" shelve the attitude when it comes to Kick-A-Thon.
"During the competition season, of course, it's competitive, but during the fundraiser they know it's for a greater cause," said Roberton, whose daughter, Delaney, is supporting five community kickers. Each drill team member has a goal of raising at least $200.
"During this," Donna said, "it is really a labor of love. It is all about thinking beyond themselves and coming together as a town, as a community."
Marmion's Clark makes history
Jackson Clark is among the last of his kind.
The Marmion junior earned medalist honors at the Suburban Christian Conference boys golf championship Oct. 1 at Arrowhead Golf Club in Wheaton. Leading the Cadets to the team title Jackson captured one of the SCC's last individual conference championships before it fades into extinction at the end of the school year.
"Our coach (Doug Roberts) kind of told us we were going to try to work out some kind of conference tournament," Clark said. Marmion came out 12 strokes ahead of St. Francis, followed by Montini and Aurora Christian.
Getting the irons to come around after landing his drives all day, Clark birdied four of the last five holes at Arrowhead to card a 76, ahead of Aurora Christian's Devin Johnson and Brett Seward.
"I just told myself to stay with it, anything can happen, and I went on my birdie streak," Clark said.
He called it his first "legit" tournament championship. Marmion got more legit in Tuesday's Class 3A Oswego sectional when it finished second at Bristol's Blackberry Oaks behind Nick Robinson and Batavia. That punched Marmion's ticket to the Hinsdale Central sectional Oct. 13 at Prairie Bluff Golf Course in Lockport.
"I probably won't forget about that," Clark said of his first tourney win. "What makes it so special is that fact that it was the last SCC (championship). That just makes it even better."
doberhelman@dailyherald.com
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