Freelance
SOFTBALL
ASH FRIEDERICH
sports@tucsoncitizen.com
The Salpointe Catholic High School softball team had pink touches to its uniforms Friday in what it hopes becomes an annual tradition.
For the past week, the team has sold raffle tickets and shirts saying “think pink” in hopes of raising awareness for breast cancer.
“I’m happy we did it because it shows we care about breast cancer,” said Salpointe’s Paige Peterson, who picked up the win over Sunnyside 2-0 on Breast Cancer Awareness Day.
“My mom had breast cancer. It’s important and it’s not small, it’s a big thing.”
Peterson’s mother, Paula, was diagnosed with breast cancer when Paige was 4.
“It’s wonderful that the school puts this on,” said Paula Peterson, an 11-year breast cancer survivor. “A lot of these schools are doing this and it’s great to get people out here. We had a great game and earned some money for the cancer society.
“Personally, this runs in my family and I’m going to be teaching (Paige) anything we can do to make kids aware to start checking themselves and doing mammograms and (learn to) take care of yourself because you can survive it.”
Paige had an RBI and struck out seven while allowing only one Sunnyside player to reach third base.
Sunnyside has gone 1-3 in its last four games after a 16-game winning streak to open the season.
“It’s a case where our pitching has done a great job, but our offense has disappeared on us,” coach Pete Palomarez said. “In the last four games, we haven’t generated any offense and that is starting to wear on the team.
For Palomarez, the game had special meaning because he lost his mother to breast cancer.
“When Salpointe asked us if we wanted to be part of this, we jumped at it because we wanted to be part of a good cause.”
” . . . It’s good to see a lot of schools and clubs take part in something like this. It’s something special.”