Marcos de Niza's Touchdown Club from the 2020 season (Photo Courtesy: Lisa Updyke)
Mackenzie Schweickart is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover Marcos de Niza for AZPreps365.com.
Fundraising looks a little different this season for the Marcos de Niza football team and its booster club due to COVID-19 restrictions, but it didn’t stop the “Touchdown Club” from meeting its goals.
Typically, athletes are allowed to sell fundraisers in person or host events that draw a crowd, but that wasn’t allowed this year because of restrictions within the Tempe Union High School District.
A major loss of funding came from the lack of a concession stand at home games. Since it’s a small space, the stand couldn’t follow COVID-19 restrictions. With no concession stand, the boosters needed to find new ways to bring in funds.
“They had to get creative this year to come up with different ways to make up for the money they weren’t able to raise due to the loss of concessions,” athletic director Lenica Ruiz said.
Booster president Lisa Updyke didn’t want the team to suffer, so she and her board members recycled some old ideas. The team did an email fundraiser in previous years, but it wasn’t normally a big ticket item. However, this year it gained traction with the team.
By using a team jacket as an incentive and an app to track progress, the email fundraiser created competition between the athletes, who tried to out-sell each other.
“It was kind of helpful last year, but this year the boys understood we want to make the program successful,” Updyke said. “Seventy-five percent of those emails raised the funds to get us there. We were able to cover some major items that we needed.”
One item was a HUDL package. HUDL is a service that allows coaches to film games and practices and review them later. The boosters budgeted $3,100 for their package and met that goal this season.
Other major fundraisers were put on hold or cancelled, such as Horse Poop Bingo, where people can buy a square on the field, and if the horse poops on that square, they win a percentage of money. While it couldn’t happen this year, the boosters are considering a virtual version of the event in the spring.
“Those types of gatherings weren’t able to happen,” Ruiz said. “That’s unfortunate because that’s where we find that our parents are really able to bond and build a stronger parents community.”
The Touchdown Club still maintained sponsors in the community to help fund the football program through donations. This year Niagara Water donated 120 cases of water to help parents save money. Restaurants like Board & Brew and Filiberto’s have days where you can mention Marcos de Niza and a percentage of the cost gets donated to the booster club for fundraising, too.
Another important item the booster club purchased—an end zone camera. With the help from sponsors, fundraising, and donations, the $2,800 camera can now be used by the football team.
Fundraising can help raise money for important and expensive items, but sometimes it’s the little items that mean more to the players and parents. This season the Touchdown Club wanted to purchase pink socks for the football team to wear during Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
What was supposed to be an easy Amazon purchase turned into a last-minute sock hunt when the socks weren’t going to arrive in time for the upcoming game. The boosters want the boys to know that they will always pull through for them when it’s important.
“I was at a JV game, and I just checked the order, but delivery moved to the next Tuesday,” Updyke said. “I had to go to five different Big 5 stores. I called all the stores, and I ended up getting all the pairs by Thursday for the game on Friday.”
Games for the Padres were different as well in the aspect of booster members on the sidelines to make sure they followed district guidelines in regard to social distancing. The parents shouted to the boys to make sure they stayed 6 feet apart and wore masks when they talked to the coach on the sideline.
Even with the loss of major fundraisers, the Touchdown Club still had funds to spare, so it purchased yard signs for the 25 seniors. Club members wanted the seniors to have something extra than the senior banner they usually get to make them feel appreciated.
“Every player that comes here, we are trying to make them feel like one of our’s,” Updyke said. “We support you, and that’s what drives me to make the club successful.”
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