Neuqua Valley’s girls basketball team defeated East Aurora 46-17 Thursday night, but if you thought that was something, you should have seen the pregame show.
The Wildcats, one of the top teams in the state, took on a dozen kids half their size and melted like the Bears in Green Bay. On Neuqua Valley’s annual Big Sister Night, though, that’s a good thing.
The kids, who come from single-mom homes where discretionary income is mostly a rumor, got pizza, presents and love. The players in turn got gratitude, a warm feeling and a reality check that comes in handy when holiday abundance is a given and your world can revolve around the numbers on a scoreboard.
“This gives us perspective about what others’ lives are like,” junior forward Alyse Robertson said as the kids munched on pizza near the gym. “Growing up in Naperville, we have Christmas every year.
“This is a really good feeling. And when you see their faces when they open their presents, it’s priceless.”
Neuqua Valley coach Mike Williams has been running a Big Sister Night for 14 years, the last seven at his current address. He invites kids who are on the waiting list for the Big Brothers Big Sisters of DuPage County program to participate.
Kids whose mothers sign up for the event provide a wish list of gifts. Players from all levels of the basketball program buy the presents with their own money, sell candy to pay for the pizza and drinks and exchange letters with the kids they are assigned.
“The players do everything–the shopping, the organizing. I’m just the middle man in this,” Williams said. “It’s a neat little deal that brings back the reality of what it’s all about.”
In past years, corporate sponsorship had allowed Williams to expand the program to dozens of kids who already have been matched with a big brother or big sister. He didn’t find a sponsor this year, so the event reached 15 kids, three of whom missed the festivities because they were ill.
They will, of course, get their gifts, but what they missed was the sound of ripping paper and the grins of delight and thanks that permeated the low-key affair. The mothers in particular appreciated that their daughters and sons, mostly ages 9 through 11, received toys that tight budgets might not have been able to provide.
That included Annette Thompson, who had brought her daughters, 9-year-old Diamond and 3-year-old Dominique, to Neuqua Valley.
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“I’m a student and not able to provide the way I’d like to,” said Thompson, who attends the College of DuPage. “When there’s something around like this, I’m touched emotionally, and I look forward to being in a place where I’m able to return the favor and give back.
“The girls are really sweet for sponsoring something like this and going into their pockets to make this moment special.”
One look at Diamond’s face as she hugged the boxes holding her new Bratz dolls, Dylan and Sasha, was enough to make that point.
“They really didn’t have to do this, but they are just trying to help the kids,” Diamond said softly. “This was fun, but I wish who I was with here was my big sister in the Big Brother Big Sister program.”
Dana Day, a case manager for DuPage BBBS, which is affiliated with Metropolitan Family Services, calls the Big Sister Night her favorite event.
“It’s because the girls and Mike are simply doing this out of the goodness of their hearts and because no one is asking them to do it or expecting them to do it,” Day said. “I think the players really enjoy buying the kids things their parents might not be able to afford, and they genuinely want to take the time to know the kids, to talk with them and laugh with them.”
That is what really made the evening priceless. The presents were great, and the pizza evaporated, but what seemed to matter most was the way some players focused on the kids.
More than an hour after the event began, Diamond and a few of her counterparts were sitting in the gym with their new friends, enjoying the sophomore game and each other.
“It’s a wonderful thing, spending time with kids less fortunate and just giving,” senior center Lindsay Wisdom-Hylton said. “It feels good to give.”
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It does, in fact, feel great to give, and you can find out yourself by writing a check to the baiduhai Holiday Campaign. You’ll be helping disadvantaged children and families and the hungry, and you’ll know that baiduhai Co. and the McCormick Tribune Foundation share all administrative costs.
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