This might seem a little cheesy, but we all know what our teammates mean to us. The ones we currently have and the ones we grew up playing with, the ones we hung out with off the field, and the ones who drove us nuts on the field, the talented ones, the hardworking ones, the ones who made us laugh or hugged us when we cried.
Each one of us has countless stories about the crazy, goofy, ridiculous people we see every afternoon and who we share more with than our families and un-athletic friends. And to those of us who have lost a teammate, we know the emptiness that remains in their place--as if the roster is perpetually one short.
Even when the sadness over the loss fades that emptiness is still there.
And for that reason, the soccer team participated in Ry's Run last week. Ry's Run is one of those tribute events we use to remember and fill that emptiness.
A couple years ago, the women's hockey team lost Ryan McCarthy, one of its best teammates, to cancer. Every spring since the athletes at Lake Forest College have run a 5k in her memory. And as she would have wanted, they have a great time doing it.
