For your convenience, we have installed the link below to make donations to this website easier. Now you can utilize your PayPal account or your credit card.

--------------

Mechanics Club

Serving the youth of our area since 1932. Click here for details.

-------------

We also have a Business Card Page. Click here. 

----------------

-------

We also have a Business Card Page. Click here. 

----------------

Click on the ad below, and go to the H.L. Stephens website

--------

---------

To go to Jim Guild's Famous Brands website, click on the drawing above or here.

From left: Bryson Clarkson, Devon Shaw and Alec Clarkson in the Carrier Dome. (Provided)

Devon meets the Orange

Cancer patient visits SU locker room, is greeted by coach and players

SYRACUSE, Feb. 21 -- It was a night to remember for Devon Shaw.

The Watkins Glen High School senior, who has been battling cancer since his freshman year, was provided a trip Wednesday night to the Syracuse University basketball game against Providence -- and much more. He also got to meet SU Coach Jim Boeheim and various players and have his picture taken alongside the coach and players James Southerland, Brandon Triche and Trevor Cooney.

It was a surprise for Devon, these meetings -- a way, said the evening's organizer, family friend and Watkins Glen mayor Mark Swinnerton, to bolster the young man's spirits as he continues his health struggles.

Devon, early in his junior year, was provided a trip to Madrid, Spain from the Make-A-Wish Foundation to meet his soccer idol, Cristiano Ronaldo. Soccer is Devon's favorite sport to play. He used to be on the varsity roster at WGHS, but his bout with cancer and attendant leg surgery relegated him to helping the team from the sidelines.

But basketball is another sport he enjoys, and he is a big Syracuse fan -- in fact knows all the players by sight, said Swinnerton -- and he got the full measure of enjoyment Wednesday night when he attended the game with Swinnerton, friends Bryson Clarkson (a fellow senior at Watkins), Alec Clarkson (a sophomore), Swinnerton's father, Rob, and the Clarksons' father, Kris.

It's been more than three years since cancer was discovered in Devon's right leg, which now carries a metal rod to help strengthen it in the wake of surgery to eliminate the disease. The past few months have seen setbacks in his battle, necessitating radiation treatments and removal of a kidney.

The normally upbeat Devon has been weakened by all of this, and needed a pick-up, said Swinnerton. And that's where this particular trip -- which the Swinnertons and Clarksons had planned for several weeks -- came into play.

Swinnerton had given six tickets for the game as a Christmas present to his father, Rob, who is an SU alum and a lifelong fan of the school's basketball team. Rob had in fact lived in the same dorm as Boeheim in their freshman year, when Boeheim was a walk-on who earned a spot on the team roster. It was decided that Rob and Mark, along with Mark's son Ben (age 9), would attend the Providence game with the three Clarksons. Kris Clarkson's wife Tammy is Mark Swinnerton's sister.

But Devon entered the picture a week before the trip, when Tammy -- a good friend of Devon's mother, Diana Crane -- called Mark to suggest that Devon needed some moral support in his battle, and that a trip to visit a team he loved would be good medicine. Mark, who has known Devon for a long time -- among other things, Devon has worked the past two summers for Rob Swinnerton in the latter's post-retirement Gizmo Mowing business -- agreed, and decided that son Ben could stay home, with Devon taking his place. Ben would have ample opportunity for more games in the future.

Then Tammy asked Mark if there was some way the trip could be more than just attendance at the Carrier Dome -- if perhaps the university might be able to make the night more of a special one.

"This was last Saturday," said Mark. "I didn't know if anything could be done, but I opened my laptop and wrote a letter" to the Coaches Vs. Cancer organization that Jim Boeheim chairs, "telling them that this was a great cause and a great kid." An hour later, a representative from the organization called Swinnerton "and asked questions, and told me he'd set it up." Amid all of this, Swinnerton sent along a video from a news report a couple of years ago concerning Devon's fight.

A followup email from the organization came Monday, asking what Swinnerton would like to see happen in particular, "and I told them a chance for Devon to meet the coach" and maybe some of the players. Back and forth contact continued until 2 p.m. Wednesday, and then the Swinnerton-Clarkson group left Schuyler County en route to the game. They went in the senior Swinnerton's SUV, a recent acquisition that has plenty of seating and leg room for a half-dozen people. But Mark drove because "we wanted to get there, and my Dad is notoriously slow driving."

When they arrived, they parked in the distant Skytop parking lot, where they were met by a van driver and taken directly to the Melo Center, a 4-year-old team training and practice facility named after former SU player Carmelo Anthony, who is now a National Basketball Association star. Anthony provided a large donation that helped jumpstart construction of the facility.

The group received a tour of the center, visiting the practice court -- where they shot hoops for about 15 minutes ("Devon made a few," said Swinnerton) -- and a physical therapy room, lounge, locker room, Boeheim's office, a team-film room, and an academic assistance room. "It's all set up so they can keep the players in one spot," Swinnerton added.

The group then rode in the van to the Carrier Dome, site of SU games, and entered through a players/coaches door. They were permitted courtside during warmups, where various of the players came over to say hello to Devon, and where he had his picture taken with the three players mentioned before. The group also encountered WGHS Principal Dave Warren there, and the boys posed for a picture with him.

Then it was time to go to their seats, up on a second level, and watch the Orangemen win -- an 84-59 victory that was their 38th straight at home.

After the game, said Swinnerton, a security guard "took us to the locker room" in the Dome where the players had adjourned, and then "to the hallway to wait for Boeheim, who was in a postgame press conference. He came out with his wife and talked to Devon for about five minutes, and was really nice."

Then, that major piece of the plan achieved, "we took the shuttle back to our car."

The entire day -- from 3 p.m. start to 12:15 a.m. arrival home, "was fantastic," said Swinnerton. The group had worn orange T-shirts for the occasion with the printed slogan "Defense for Devon" -- words often seen on green T-shirts worn by students in the hallways of WGHS. And they came home with some autographs -- on SU seat cushions they'd purchased in a gift shop, on programs, and (in Devon's case) on a basketball given him that had been signed by all of the players.

Devon, although in obvious pain from his recent struggles and with his stamina reduced, "did not complain once," said Swinnerton. "I know him pretty well, and he really put on his game face. He is always positive ... a great spirit.

"I tell you, it was a fabulous experience. The Melo Center tour wasn't even in the plans; they just added it because they thought we might like it."

The SU staff went out of its way to accommodate the group and make Devon feel welcome. "Not one time during the whole day," said Swinnerton, "did we feel like we were impeding on their day, their jobs. They made sure Devon didn't have to walk far -- they provided the van, and elevator access whenever possible. It makes me as a person feel good, to know there is humanity out there that does this. They gave us far more than we asked for."

And the bottom line was this: "Devon had a great time."

Photos in text:

Top: Syracuse basketball coach Jim Boeheim and Devon Shaw.
Second: Syracuse player James Southerland with Devon.
Third: Devon with Syracuse player Trevor Cooney.
Fourth: Devon with Syracuse player Brandon Triche.
Fifth: At the entrance to the Melo Center.
Sixth: The travel group, from left: Mark Swinnerton, Rob Swinnerton, Kris Clarkson, Bryson Clarkson, Devon Shaw, Alec Clarkson.
Seventh: WGHS Principal Dave Warren poses with Bryson, Devon and Alec. (Photos provided)