Hockey game is more than a sporting event Opponent 'is cancer,' says player taking part in annual fundraiser
Bill Lipchak pulled on his jersey, strapped on his skates and grabbed his hockey stick -- which is not what you might normally expect a 56-year-old cancer survivor to do.
But there was Lipchak yesterday, about to take the ice at the Richmond Coliseum to play alongside his two sons, Jay, 29, and Ben, 19, in a game to raise money to fight cancer.
"I guarantee you," said Lipchak, as he left the dressing room a few minutes before the first puck was dropped, "this will be the best day of my life."
Lipchak, who at age 49 was diagnosed with prostate cancer, was captain of the Richmond Hockey Fights Cancer team, which played the Sperry Marine team from Charlottesville in the fifth annual Hockey for Hope benefit game. Sperry Marine won, 3-2, but that really wasn't the point.
"Our opponent today is cancer," Lipchak said.
Richmond Hockey Fights Cancer is a grass-roots charity within the local hockey community. Through previous games, the group has raised more than $70,000. Lipchak said yesterday's game -- including ticket and merchandise sales, as well as sponsorships -- would raise almost as much as last year's $19,000.
The Richmond team's players know one another from local "beer league" teams, as Rusty Harrington put it, and share a devotion to local cancer-related organizations, such as the ASK Pediatric Hematology/ Oncology Clinic at VCU Medical Center that some of the players visited last week.
Most players have been touched in some way by cancer, he said, and try to help those battling the disease, from participating in blood drives to hat collections for chemotherapy patients.
"I don't know if we play inspiring hockey," Harrington said, "but we are dedicated to our cause."
What does true dedication look like? How about a hot-pink ribbon of hair shaved into the top of Lee Stryker's mostly bald head.
"I feel bad making people pay to watch me play hockey, so I thought I could at least give them a chuckle," said Stryker, one of the event's original organizers who annually goes the mohawk route for the game.
This was the first time he's wound up with a pink ribbon, the symbol of breast-cancer awareness, on his head. It looked stylish with his dark suit; he sat out yesterday's game recovering from hip surgery.
A few hundred family members and friends turned out for the event, which had all the trappings of a professional game -- from the singing of the American and Canadian national anthems, the spotlight shining on the players as they were introduced and even the Zamboni refreshing the ice between periods. There were even a few board-rattling checks.
Brad Robinson skated yesterday for the Richmond team, but he has his sights on another athletic endeavor: an Ironman competition in Florida this year at which he will swim, bike and run 140 miles to raise money for cancer research. Like the hockey game, it's an opportunity to make a sporting event "mean more."
"It kind of gives it a higher purpose," Robinson said.
Contact Bill Lohmann at (804) 649-6639 or wlohmann@timesdispatch.com.
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