Players, coaches plan Engelhardt tribute

Players and coaches in the Schaumburg Athletic Association's summer softball league plan a special tribute Saturday during their opening day ceremony to Al and Laura Engelhardt.

The jerseys of Laura, a player on the Blizzard team, and Al, the team's first-base coach, will be displayed during the parade of team banners. All players in the league will be given a patch to wear on their shorts in memory of Laura (850 patches were ordered), and Blizzard team members plan to sell bracelets for $2 that say "Never Forgotten - Laura (heart) Al". Proceeds will be donated to the Engelhardt family fund.

During the first game of the season, the Blizzards will intentionally play without a first-base coach in memory of Al. Throughout the season, Blizzard team members will wear purple shoelaces to call attention to domestic violence, said Blizzard Manager Denise Higgins.

Laura Engelhardt, 18, Al Engelhardt, 57, and Laura's grandmother Marlene Gacek, 73, were all fatally stabbed April 17 during an attack in their Hoffman Estates home. D'Andre "Dre" Howard, 20, the fiance of Laura's older sister, Amanda, has been charged with three counts of murder and is being held in jail without bond.

A wake for all three family members will be from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. today at Ahlgrim & Sons, 330 W. Golf Road, in Schaumburg. The Engelhardts' funerals will be Thursday and Gacek's is Friday.

The girls on the team keep coming up with more and more ideas on how to memorialize Laura and Al.

"Laura and Al were pretty much inseparable. Every time you saw Laura, her Dad was there," Higgins said. "It's just so sad."