To be able to truly impact people’s lives is a privilege not lost on everyone who has been involved in this initiative. It takes more time and energy over the course of months to pull something like this off, and it’s worth every. single. second. The excellence that’s represented in this program lies in the authentic effort to focus on improving lives – Something we take great pride in at UCHealth. There are countless other opportunities to focus on driving impressions, views, engagements, retweets, and shares. There’s no shame in partnership activations that focus on numbers, benchmarks, KPIs and ROI. But if the core of the mission is to uplift human beings, to share their stories and give them a moment of pride in themselves… if that’s not excellence, I don’t know what is. We need to do a better job as an industry of remembering that sports fans are people first and foremost, not consumers.

The primary objective focused around storytelling- narratives of hope in a seemingly hopeless time. UCHealth has engaged our partners for years in creating memories for patients and their families; some of whom are no longer with us. It becomes an opportunity to create a legacy moment for the lives of these individuals- not just as cancer patients, but as Rams fans in this particular case. Student-athletes were asked to sacrifice the family name they represent on the back of their jersey for one game- from the leading scorer all the way down the bench- in the spirit of something greater than themselves and to honor a greater battle being fought off the court by a member of their community.

Through a rigorous process, UCHealth was able to identify and confirm 28 total cancer warriors and families who bled green and gold, whether as fans, alumni, or in one case: a current freshman at CSU. Because they weren’t able to attend the game live, we had to create special touchpoints to ensure these warriors felt honored and valued even more than ever. UCHealth hosted a Zoom call with both teams where coaches, athletes and patients expressed their admiration and gratitude to represent/be represented by members of their own community. More than a few tears were shed by students and warriors alike. Players wrote hand-written letters to their jersey counterparts, and some of those relationships continue via calls, e-mail and texts to this day. CSU’s marketing team evoked the emotion of each game through various media, and news outlets were secured to highlight specific stories.