Events and Activities : Fifth annual VS Vikettes basketball Pink Night set for Monday

The fifth annual Vinton-Shellsburg high school girls basketball Pink Night will take place Monday, Feb. 3, at the VSHS gym. The event will honor area breast cancer survivors and help raise funds for the Gifts of Hope mammography fund.

It was in 2010 that Vikette Coach Deb Schirm worked with others in the school and the community to invite breast cancer survivors to a special fund-raising event during a high school girls basketball game.

That event was the beginning of a long-term relationship between VS high school sports teams, the local breast cancer survivors and Virginia Gay Hospital. After that inaugural event in 2010, the women who have fought the disease began meeting monthly and soon invited others to the Benton County Breast Cancer Survivors. Several events have helped raise money to fight breast cancer, specifically through helping fund the new mammography unit in the VGH Imaging Service Dept, as well as creating and sustaining a fund to help pay for mammography services for women who cannot afford the procedure.

Many in the crowd will wear pink t-shirts to honor survivors, many of whom will attend and participate in special activities during halftime of the varsity game.