Crown Sports Holds Spring Bash to Benefit Local Girl Battling Cancer

Dodgeball at Crown Sports Center (Courtesy: Crown Sports Center)

Brooke Mulford is an 11-year-old fighting a battle against neuroblastoma and on Saturday, April 9, she will be taking her efforts to Crown Sports Center.

The first annual Crown Sports Center “Spring Bash” will begin on Saturday at 10 a.m. to support the Brooke Mulford Foundation. The event will feature a 48-team dodgeball tournament with a 24- team adult division and 24-team youth division. Entry into the dodgeball tournament costs $200 a team and all proceeds go toward Brooke and her family.

Director of Sports at Crown Sports Center Cole Lacey said the establishment was built off of giving back to the community.

“We wanted to give back and support a local foundation. Brooke was actually someone who played soccer here when she was younger so we thought it was perfect.”

Around 11:30 a.m., the 24-team cornhole tournament begins. It costs $10 for each team and, like the dodgeball tournament, all proceeds go toward the cause.

While both of the tournaments are going on, Meredith Rounsley, an acoustic artist, will play at 12:30 p.m., with Sobo’s Wine Beerstro and SweetFrog coming in swinging the event into full gear. SweetFrog and Sobo’s will serve their products with a percentage of sales going towards the cause.

At the end of Meredith Rounsley’s performance, Crown will announce the winners of the door prizes at the event. Various local organizations and community members have already donated to the cause including Nutters Crossing and the Delmarva Shorebirds.

How to Help

On Jan. 5, 2009, Brooke Mulford was diagnosed with Stage IV high risk neuroblastoma. Since then, Brooke has endured eight rounds of chemotherapy, four surgeries, two stem cell transplants, bone marrow biopsies, blood and platelet transfusions and more.

In 2010, Brooke was classified as “no evidence of disease” and finished all her treatments. Every three months after that, Brooke was monitored closely for possible late effects from all treatments. In 2012, Brooke relapsed and has been fighting ever since.

Brooke has participated in Phase 1 clinical trials at CHOP, Boston Children’s Dana Farber Cancer Institute and NIH, however, there are currently no open clinical trials.

Brooke is currently taking a standard chemotherapy daily at home until a clinical trial opens up.

To learn more about the Brooke Mulford Foundation, go to brookemulford.org.