People are used to rallying around a sports team. That’s what showing up to games and being a supporter means. However, sometimes the rallying cry around a team is about more than the game on the field. Significant proceeds from the North Carolina Courage’s game against the San Diego Wave this Saturday will go to relief efforts in the western part of the state following Hurricane Helene. That includes tickets sales, concessions and merchandise, as well as a special ‘For the Love of North Carolina’ shirt, with 100% of those proceeds going to relief efforts. There will also be stations to donate directly through The United Way. Sports teams can be the pillar of a community and in moments when those communities need help, those teams have an obligation to step up and not only support directly but galvanize those around them to do the same. “These things tend to lose sight of the media after a week or two and I think, we as a club, have an obligation to make sure that doesn’t happen. What we’re doing this weekend is great and it shouldn’t be a one-off. We should be doing everything we possibly can to help them get back on their feet. That goes for the whole state. We can’t stop talking about it,” Courage Head Coach Sean Nahas said. Relief efforts are underway in Western North Carolina, and it will take all of us to help our neighbors in need. The Courage are asking the community to stand with them to support our state. Courage captain Denise O’Sullivan has been vocal about the importance of rallying behind our neighbors. “It’s important for the club to support the relief efforts and step up and help the community and state because during these tough times coming together to support one another really makes a big difference. Our community and people in our state come and support the team however they can and when they can and that means a lot to us. Now it is time for us to do the same for them,” O’Sullivan said. A Jersey Shore native who lived through Sandy and a member of the NFL commissioner’s task force in New Orleans following Katrina, North Carolina Football Club Chief Operating Officer Ralph Vuono has seen first-hand the devastation of those storms and the importance of community organizations stepping up in their aftermath. “It has stayed with me my entire career. That is what sports can do for a community,” Vuono said of working in New Orleans after Katrina. Vuono was just a few years out of college when he served on the NFL commissioner’s task force and the rallying between the community and New Orleans Saints in the aftermath made a major impact on him. At the time, the rallying cry from then-NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue wasn’t about saving the Saints, it was about saving the city. “‘America had never lost a city.’ That was his rallying cry and the data they were getting said that if the Saints left and didn’t come back, there was a chance we were going to lose New Orleans. We weren’t just doing it to bring back a football team, but to save a city. That is what the team and the community got behind. That was my first experience understanding how important a sports team can be and the role they play for a community in a moment of crisis,” Vuono said. On a personal level following Sandy, Vuono saw what the different New Jersey/New York teams did and how the fans rallied around those initiatives. “The community rallied and found a way to support the teams and go to games because it was about something bigger than the sport. We did that. My family went to games and made sure that we bought tickets because it was about being a part of something. It was a good way for us to give back,” Vuono said. For Vuono, the relationship between sports teams, their fans, and the communities around them are about partnership. Many of those relationships have shifted to being transactional in recent years, but that partnership is what can drive a team and fans to come together for something bigger than the game on the field. “It is supposed to be a collaboration. We are supposed to support one another. It is about understanding that we are in this together. If we treat it as a partnership and a collaboration, that is how you can create and support a movement like what is happening right now with relief efforts. We have equal responsibility to support something bigger than both of us,” Vuono said. Community can be a powerful force and Saturday is an opportunity for Courage Country to come together for something bigger than the game.