(photo via ACU Sports)
The Department of Athletics has partnered with the women’s basketball team to start a GoFundMe account for the mother of freshman guard Sara Williamson, Sue Williamson.
Williamson’s mother was diagnosed with cancer in early November of last year, just a month before the women’s basketball team began its historic 14-game win streak. Athletics unveiled the partnership before the Wildcats’ annual “Play4Kay” game against Sam Houston State.
Scott Hadding, external operations coordinator, said the GoFundMe account was the result of a collaboration of two events occurring around the same time.
“Every February, college basketball programs across the nation unify to raise awareness, support, and funding for breast cancer under the title of ‘Play4Kay’, in recognition of the organization’s namesake, Kay Yow,” Hadding said. “For us here at ACU, this theme hit extremely close to home with us having known that Sue Williamson was battling this disease head on.”
After being made aware of the situation by head coach Julie Goodenough, Hadding said he knew they had to do something.
“When I first heard about Sue undergoing treatments for her breast cancer, and understanding firsthand the grueling physical and emotional toll it takes on a family,“ Hadding said. “I knew we couldn’t just sit around and do nothing. I proposed the idea of the GoFundMe account and everyone was on board.”
Goodenough said this is the second time in the last three years cancer has hit so close to home.
“Unfortunately, I feel like more than not we’re going to have a mom or an aunt or a sister or someone going through that or being a breast cancer survivor probably every year,” Goodenough said. “It’s unfortunate, but the cool thing is with women’s basketball we always dedicate one game in February to be our breast cancer awareness game.”
The account officially went live 11 days ago after Goodenough said all the NCAA regulations checked out.
“We talked about maybe selling pink T-shirts to bring in some money to give to Sue Williamson just to help defer some medical expenses,” Goodenough said. “A lot of things in the NCAA if it sounds like a good idea you can’t do it, and so we were just trying to figure out what we could do to help that family financially. We are just hoping that there will be a good response from the ACU family, just to help Sara and her mom.”
So far the campaign has raised $1,275 of an initial goal of $10,000 for the Williamson family.
“It truly is heartwarming. From a personal standpoint, ACU Athletics, along with the university as a whole, is different,” Hadding said. It’s different in the sense that we are all a family, we help one another when times are tough.”
