thom trojans, sheldon williams spartans football teams preparing to beat cancer
second annual game has extra meaning to players on both teams
sep 12 2024
3 minute read
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a regina intercollegiate football league game between the thom trojans and sheldon-williams spartans has become much more than a friendly rivalry between two stewart conference teams.
“football’s great and it’s fun to play a game,” said spartans head coach chris latimer. “but there’s a lot of other things going around us that are bigger than the game.”
that’s why the teams last year organized a beat cancer game, in part to honour families and coaches who were affected by the disease. the second annual game is slated for friday, 5:15 p.m. at leibel field. there will be a donation box at the park, with all contributions going towards cancer research.
thom has a 1-0 record while sheldon is 0-1 .
one of latimer’s assistant coaches, pete paczko, is dealing with cancer. a long-time volunteer coach who is also known as the host of “locker talk” on access communications, paczko is getting extra support from the young spartans.
“pete’s quite the human being, easy to rally around,” said latimer. “the players really get behind him. when he was going through chemotherapy, we had players who would walk his dog, stay with him and chat, just to keep him company. it’s been a rallying point for our school anyway.”
each of the schools has long been involved in fund-raising initiatives for cancer research . partly because of the beat cancer game, the players are now attending each other’s activities, despite the (thom) north-south (sheldon) rivalry. last season the trojans drew extra inspiration from gord macquarrie, the team’s volunteer defensive co-ordinator on head coach ross vanstone’s staff, who died of cancer the day following thom’s dramatic, 18-17 victory over sheldon.
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“we scored literally on a last-second touchdown,” said vanstone. “our quarterback took off, like, 80 yards down the sideline for a last-minute touchdown. we went for the two-pointer (convert), got it and won.
“i know (macquarrie) didn’t witness it, but it was his last game on earth. it was unique, to win in a miracle way. so it’s kind of cool that way, you know?”
vanstone spoke about the fondness his players had for macquarrie, how they cared for him and opened up to their coaches when discussing cancer. latimer said his team last season had two players, new to football, whose mother was undergoing cancer treatments and spoke about feeling welcomed and supported by their teammates.
“there’s no bad blood,” said vanstone. “it’s a fun rivalry for us. when gord died, sheldon reached out to us with cards and telling us they had our backs. when we found out about pete, i messaged chris and told him, ‘whatever you need from us …’
“you still wanna beat them but we’re always gonna be friends.”
before last year’s game the teams ran onto the field together with a banner reading, “everything matters.” coaches, students and spectators may be wearing commemorative shirts this year adorned with the logos of each team and the words, “united against cancer.”
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“we probably won’t run onto the field together,” said latimer. “we’ll have our banner up between the benches, do a regular warmup, gather everyone for a pregame talk about football and other things like that, then go our separate ways and knock heads for an hour or so.”
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