News

NEW YORK — Hockey Hall of Famers Pat LaFontaine and Luc Robitaille will represent the NHL as guests of Pope Francis during a three-day global conference focusing on faith and sport at the Vatican from Oct. 5-7.

The inaugural Sport at the Service of Humanity conference will bring together 150 athletes and executives in an attempt to promote positive values and inspire youth.

Brazilian soccer legend Pele, professional tennis player Roger Federer and retired NBA players Yao Ming and Dikembe Mutombo also will attend.

HUNTINGTON, NY, September 29, 2016  –  Pat LaFontaine hosted his annual CiC Foundation Golf Classic at Huntington Country Club on Long Island and helped raise money and awareness for the organization that now serves 50,000 patients per year in hospitals throughout North America.

The date of the event was bumped up one week to accommodate LaFontaine’s invite to participate in a conference on Sports, Faith and Humanity at the Vatican on October 5-7. To commemorate that extraordinary event, a 3’ x 2’ photo of Pope Francis was ubiquitous throughout the Golf Classic.

·         By John Vogl  – Buffalo News, Sept. 7, 2016

Pat LaFontaine, Pele, Roger Federer and Yao Ming are sports icons capable of headlining any event they attend. Yet when they come together next month for a historic global conference, the most well-known participant will be a man who’s never scored a goal, won a Grand Slam or appeared in the Olympics.

The event leader will be Pope Francis, who can transfix a packed stadium with a simple wave of his hand.

The pope, however, is aware athletes also have legions of followers, so he has invited a select few to the Vatican for the first global conference on faith and sport. The three-day event, titled “Sport at the Service of Humanity,” will bring together 150 athletes and executives from different religions and countries to discuss how faith and sport can work together to promote positive values, inspire youth and better serve humanity.

One for the Ages: A Tribute to Bill Benson

When Bill Benson passed away on July 16^th at the tender age of 97, the Runner’s Edge Main Street Mile race committee made the decision to honor him at the 12^thannual event. Bill had been a long-time participant in the event and had a great fan in Pat LaFontaine.  

The hockey hall of Famer said, “Bill represented a spirit and enthusiasm that was contagious. He participated in almost 1,000 road races in his life and always made the people around him feel better.”

At this year’s finish on September 3^rd in Farmingdale, the inaugural “Bill Benson Award” was presented to 89-year-old Bert Jablon as the oldest finisher of the race. We know that Bill Benson was smiling on us all.

By KARA YORIO   STAFF WRITER |  The Record

The room was getting increasingly crowded, but 12-year-old Ahtziri Garcia and her brother didn’t notice. They were busy playing with a new XBox console, laughing and competing against each other at Monday’s official opening of the Lion’s Den interactive playroom at the Joseph M. Sanzari Children’s Hospital at Hackensack University Medical Center.

The Lion’s Den rooms provide patients like Garcia with computers, televisions and Xbox consoles and allows the kids to not only play with others in the room, but connect and communicate with the outside world. The rooms are the work of Companions in Courage, the foundation of NHL Hall of Famer Pat LaFontaine, who played for the Rangers, Islanders and Buffalo Sabres over his 15-year career.

In 2014, 18-year-old Jackson Krase and his dad, Scott, led a team of 15 to the summit of Africa’s 19,000-foot Mount Kilimanjaro in a fundraising effort for Maria Fareri Children’s Hospital. In doing so, the group raised more than $55,000.  As per Jackson’s request, the monies were used to refurbish the original Lion’s Den, opened at the hospital in 2004.

On May 21st, Pat LaFontaine was joined by Brenda Fareri, Dr. Michael Gewitz, Physician-in-Chief at MFCH and Michael Israel of Westchester Medical Center. Here is how Fios-1 covered the story http://www.fios1news.com/lowerhudsonvalley/node/75566#.VWR8tIdOXct.

At the completion of Pat LaFontaine’s Hall of Fame hockey career, he set out to combine his passions in a best-of-breed manner, to benefit those less fortunate. He worked with Warner Books to pen his semi-autobiographical book, “Companions in Courage.” All of the proceeds from the sale of the book were used to start a foundation of the same name to benefit children’s hospitals.

He then partnered with industry giants like ESI Design, Microsoft, the NHL and DuPont to create interactive rooms that connect pediatric patients with their family, classmates and heroes. His Lion’s Dens rooms now benefit more than 50,000 hospitalized children per year throughout North America.

By JAN HOFFMAN, New York Times

December 15, 2014

Orange, Calif. — Nick Meza, 18, recently had another five-day round of chemotherapy at the outpatient clinic here at Children’s Hospital of Orange County. Usually those days drag for Nick, an Eagle Scout with a flashing grin, a hunger for conversation, and acute lymphoblastic leukemia.

Like most patients who get intravenous medication at a pediatric clinic, Nick typically receives treatment in a small, curtained cubicle with hospital-green walls, outdated video games that are often broken, tiny TV monitors, and dividers that don’t muffle hallway clatter or the wails of a child in the next cubicle.

Cord Lehman receives a special gift

Four hours after his heart operation at Cohen Children’s Medical Center, Cord Lehman, 17, of Syosset, was sitting in a chair, texting and tweeting.

A day later, he went home.

And a little more than two weeks later, he said he felt great.

“I am back to being me and that’s all I want to be,” said the graduating senior from Syosset High School at a news conference Thursday at the New Hyde Park hospital.

Students from PS 119 drop off toys for patients

On Wednesday, May 28th, three National Honor Society members representing the students of PS/IS 119 in Glendale, NY, delivered hundreds of new stuffed toys to the pediatric patients at Cohen Children’s Medical Center in New Hyde Park. The toys will be used to teach patients about recovery from their medical treatments and simply to cuddle.

The idea for the community service project was spawned by Craig Edelman, a teacher at the school. He said, “I am a big Pat LaFontaine fan. When I saw what he was doing (opening of a Lion’s Den Room) at Cohen Children’s, I thought, how can we get involved?” Edelman rallied his National Honor Society members to begin a letter-writing campaign to ask for donations of new stuffed toys. Over the course of several months, the group was successful in obtaining almost 200 new stuffed toys for the pediatric patients.