July 26, 2005

Spartanbrug, SC - As part of the ongoing football rouser festivities, the Southern Conference sent a group of student-athletes to the Spartanburg Regional Hospital on Monday morning. Sixteen football players, representing all eight of the Southern Conference schools who sponsor football, made the visit.

The players were split into two groups during the first part of their visit, with one group visiting the pediatric section of the hospital and another visiting the oncology department.

The players forayed into the rooms of the patients at Spartanburg Regional, interacting with the patients and their families.

Each player also had a special gift from their college or university to give to the people that they were visiting.

The gifts from the players were also given to many hospital staff in appreciation of what they do because, as Furman quarterback Ingle Martin so eloquently put it,: "they deserve it because they are here day in and out, giving their time to these people."

After the players took time out to visit the patients, they made their way to the Spartanburg Regional Hospital System Child Development Center that houses the daycare for children of the hospital staff.

The players went into three different classrooms and spent time sharing with the kids and playing games with them. In one classroom, players were participating with children by playing board games, such as "Monopoly" and checkers.

One group was assigned to a first-grade classroom where they were able to talk to the children and play with their class bunny, Flopsy.

The football players even played a spirited game of dodgeball with the children with plush basketballs that were given away by the Wofford players.