Ware Lacrosse Laces Up for Blood Cancer

When the Ware Academy boys’ and girls' lacrosse teams took the field for the 2008 first annual Ware Academy Lacrosse Invitational on May 10th, the 200+ spectators were not able to miss the Waves’ feet. The Waves participanted in the HEADstrong Foundation’s “Laces for Lymphoma” program where, in exchange for $10, they receive a pair of lime green HEADstrong shoe laces. The HEADstrong Foundation was created by Nick Collelouri, a Hofstra University lacrosse player who eventually succumbed to Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma in 2006 at the age of 21 years old. The Foundation has only grown since Nick’s death. The Laces for Lymphoma program is a simple idea that has created not only a fluorescent-green buzz in the youth, high school, and college sports realm, but has also raised over $100,000 towards fighting blood cancers.

Prior to Hofstra University, Nick played lacrosse at Ridley High School, just outside of Philadelphia, the same high school where Waves’ coach Chris Petrone played several years prior to Nick’s tenure. The lacrosse program at Ridley is rich with tradition, so Petrone felt the Laces for Lymphoma program was not only benefiting a great cause, but also a natural fit for the budding Ware Academy lacrosse program. “I never met Nick, but we share similar roots. I can’t imagine what he and his family went through during his battle with cancer,” said Petrone. “It was the least our program could do for the Collelouris and the Foundation.”

The Waves lacrosse team joins the ranks of some powerful and well-known college lacrosse programs around the country also wearing the lime green laces, including Collelouri’s alma mater, Hofstra, Loyola College (Md.), Penn State, Notre Dame, Army, and Drexel University. Lacrosse players are not the only ones donning the HEADstrong laces; they can also be found on athletes playing volleyball, soccer, and baseball. “Our boys and girls have a lot to be proud of,” said Petrone about the successes the Ware Lacrosse program has obtained in its short three year history, “hopefully the laces will create an even larger sense of pride knowing they are a part of something so much bigger than we are.”

For more information about the HEADstrong Foundation, please visit their website.