Dream Team all-stars and scholarship winners highlight Gator Bowl holiday party

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Representatives from some Texas A&M and Wake Forest were successful municipality Thursday to judge the authoritative invitation to play successful the Taxslayer Gator Bowl connected News Year’s Eve morning. But the existent deed of the Gators Bowl’s yearly Holiday Party came from 2 groups of kids.

The Gator vessel presented 4 scholarships, worthy $2,500 each, to Caleb Moncrief of Keystone Heights, Kyra Brenneman from Creekside. Bishop Kenny’s Natalie Otero and Evan Fleischer of Ponte Vedra for academics, athletics, and assemblage involvement.

They besides introduced 12 Dream Team All-Stars. Each year, partnering with Dreams Come True, the Gator Bowl selects a twelve kids battling life-threatening illnesses. This year, 12 past Dream Team members were chosen arsenic Dream Team All-Stars.

“It’s existent amusive due to the fact that I got to conscionable each of these different radical who went done hard times, conscionable (like) me,” said Andrew Eunis. “We get to spell tailgating and past spell into the stadium and ticker the game.”

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Smiling receptor to receptor portion sitting successful his wheelchair, Jacob Lopez said his archetypal clip connected the Dream Team offered him a accidental to enslaved with different kids successful his situation, including his champion friend, with whom helium strengthened a enslaved connected the Dream Team.

“I similar gathering radical with life-threatening illnesses and I emotion gathering caller radical with similarities to me,” said Lopez.

This twelvemonth connected the Dream Team all-stars offed Joshua Ribeiro a accidental to beryllium much progressive than helium was capable to the archetypal clip helium was selected.

“The archetypal clip I joined the Dream Team, I had nary thought what to expect. I was going done a batch of chemo treatments, truthful I was capable to beryllium astatine immoderate of the events, and I wasn’t capable to (some of the time) and I was capable to conscionable a clump of astonishing people,” Ribeiro said. “And it was an perfectly astonishing acquisition to get extracurricular of treatment, but besides speech to radical who were going done what I was going through.”

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The kids each beamed astir the experience, arsenic did Dreams Come True enforcement manager Sheri Criswell, who said the programme has made a large quality for the kids successful the program.

“It’s an unthinkable experience. Not lone bash they get to consciousness the emotion from the radical successful the Gator Bowl, they get to acquisition the crippled and person a small amusive and a reprieve from their regular activities of dealing with a life-threatening illness,” Criswell said.

The crippled is often the header grabber, but successful truth, what the Gator Bowl does successful the assemblage leaves a overmuch larger and lasting impression.

“That’s what it’s each about,” said Gator Bowl president Greg McGarrity. “Our relation is to bash large things for Jacksonville. That not lone means putting connected a large crippled and putting heads successful bed. But it’s besides paying attraction to the needs of the community. We’re conscionable truthful arrogant to beryllium affiliated with truthful galore fantastic people. This is simply a big, large woody for these kids.”

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Tickets for the Taxslayer Gator Bowl are connected sale via the games’ website.

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