Lady Hawks soccer program holding car wash fundraiser

The Harmon Lady Hawks soccer program is an up and coming program in Kansas City, Kan., but that comes with a price.

The Lady Hawks are hoping you can help in making that price is a little less difficult to match.

Harmon's girls soccer program will be holding a car wash fundraiser on Saturday, Aug. 27, from 9 a.m. – 5 p.m. at the Advance Auto Parts at 1 S. 18th Street.

Donations for $5 or more are welcomed.

Funds generated by the car wash will be used to help purchase soccer warm-up jerseys and other equipment the team will use next spring.

Harmon has won league three years running and have had their two best seasons in school history the past two years.

For more information, check out their Facebook page here.

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A good article about the Ming family

Former Schlagle Stallions standout athlete Eli Ming is now pitching for the Hutchinson Monarchs baseball team out of Hutchinson, Kansas.

This article from The Hutchinson News touches on a tragedy the Ming family suffered from and how Eli still literally carries it around with him.

Just a portion:

When Ming was a year old, he had a baby brother born. But the baby was born premature. Ming said his little brother died after a few days.

Ming understands people are curious about the bear. The questions have been coming since Ming bought the bear when he was in seventh grade and began taking it everywhere.

Care to guess his brother's name? Judah.

The story is a touching one.

Having spoken with the Ming family over the past two years, they are very classy family and one that has deserved every bit of success they've earned.

It's hard not to pull for the family and I hope Isaiah Ming has a barn-burner of a season for Harmon this year on the gridiron.

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Sources: McCoy transfers to Hogan Prep

There will be a big hole in the middle this winter for the Washington Wildcats basketball team.

KCK Preps has learned that Washington Wildcats forward Rakim McCoy has transferred to Hogan Prep Academy in Kansas City, Mo.

McCoy led the city last year in blocks and was named The Kansas City Kansan's Defensive Player of the Year for the 2010-11 school year.

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Support the Kansas City Blue Dogs

Consider this an endorsement from me on a program involving Kansas City, Kan., sports.

The Kansas City Blue Dogs are a local AAU/summer league basketball team featured in KCK. The team is mostly for middle school students, although some high school students have played on the team before in the past.

They usually practice out of the Boys and Girls Club in downtown KCK.

They are a core KCK product and have featured some of the best home-grown talent KCK has had over the past five to 10 years.

Derrick Estelle serves as head coach of that team.

Estelle preaches values and teaches athletes lessons that go beyond the court. If I had a son who could play basketball, Estelle would be the first coach in KCK I would turn to coach him.

Estelle makes sure his kids are responsible when they play in a big game and in life.

Many of the players he coached years ago still keep in contact with him.

I will not do posts like these very often, but I feel like I need to in the case of the Kansas City Blue Dogs.

In the case of high school and middle school athletics, a lot can go wrong. I have profiled a bit of that this summer.

But every so often, a good program that teaches kids personal values comes along that is worth supporting. Not to get too high on a soap box, but the basic values system America used to feature have been lost.

Even though he's just a coach, Estelle does a good job at promoting those life values that help shape the human being – not just the basketball player.

Like many good programs, the current economic situation has hurt the Blue Dogs efforts to generate fundraising money in order to travel to AAU tournaments.

If you have even just $1 to spare, consider putting it into a program that helps kids out.

For more information about the Blue Dogs and how you can donate to them, contact Estelle at (913) 221-8304.

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