It wasn’t long after news of the sudden and untimely death of local hockey standout Brady Grasdal that the Moose Jaw community began to rally around their fallen friend and his family.
Tributes to the 21-year-old former Moose Jaw Generals forward poured in on social media, with friends and acquaintances expressing their grief and showing support to Brady’s family after he passed away while on vacation in the Dominican Republic.
That included many of his former teammates and coaches, one of whom put together a plan to boost a special fundraiser for the family at a U15 AA Warriors game this past Saturday.
What started as a conversation between Shawn Kohl and a friend eventually resulted in thousands of dollars being raised for the Grasdals from a massive 50-50 ticket draw at the game, which drew close to 700 people to the Moose Jaw Events Centre.
“When we found out the news it was pretty devastating,” said Kohl, who had coached Brady in football and hockey and whose family are friends with the Grasdals. “So we went through a lot of emotions over a few days in our family and didn't really know what to do with those emotions. And once we heard that there was a game coming up, and the team was going to be donating the proceeds of the 50-50 to the family, we kind of viewed it as an opportunity where we can offer some of our talents and initiatives to help out the family in a very small way.”
Kohl family runs Kohl’s Yard Care during the summer months, and through conversations with John Spencer and others, came up with a plan to donate to the 50-50 to create a guaranteed pot. Kohl reached out to John Iatridis at the Mad Greek -- a longtime supporter of minor hockey in the community -- and together they were able to create a $1,000 guaranteed jackpot.
Not long after, fellow minor hockey supporter Todd Schoenroth threw another $500 into the pot to make it a $1,500 guarantee, and word quickly began to spread about what was happening at the game. The contest -- which saw the U15 AA Warriors taking on the Sask East Oilers -- was originally scheduled to be played at the Bert Hunt, but it wasn’t long before it became apparent that wasn’t going to be viable,
The end result saw the game moved to the 4,500-seat Moose Jaw Events Centre on short notice, with the City of Moose Jaw quickly stepping up to make the change happen.
“It was great they were able to get that done, and then the community came out and did their part and were so supportive," Kohl said.
The Warriors' parents themselves were all in on supporting the venture, selling 50-50s throughout the night and doing all they could to make sure as much money was raised as possible.
So how did it turn out?
While the final total is still being calculated, it’s expected the donation to the family will easily be well into the thousands of dollars, more than anyone could have hoped at the start of the project.
“It was just a tireless effort by the team on behalf of the family.” Kohl lauded. “They really went above and beyond donating their time, their effort, it was just such a phenomenal response… I'm sure (the Grasdals) are very appreciative of the hockey community, and really the entire community as a whole for the response that they've received.”
The community isn’t done just yet, either.
A Rib and Caesar Salad fundraiser is taking place on Saturday, Dec. 30 at Bugsy’s Irish Pub from 3 p.m. to 9 p.m. and at Smitty’s from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. Tickets are $20 each and are available by reaching out to Shauna Pollock, Jo Overby, Shelan Polley-Dueck or Deonne Renee on Facebook.
Two friends of Brady are also selling special edition BG 24 hoodies as a fundraising venture, with the sweatshirts on sale for $80 each. Contact Hayden at (306) 690-7899 or Matt at (306) 750-8705 with your size, colour and how many you’d like in addition to any other information.
