CCU

Basketball Coaches to Go Barefoot for Bare Feet

Cliff Ellis and Alan LeForce will go Barefoot for Bare Feet to raise awareness for Samaritan's Feet.

       

Feb. 5, 2010

CONWAY, S.C. – Coastal Carolina University head basketball coaches Cliff Ellis and Alan LeForce will be going Barefoot for Bare Feet as part of the Big South’s involvement with Samaritan’s Feet. 

 

Ellis will go barefoot Saturday, Feb. 6 at 4:30 p.m., while LeForce will go barefoot Monday, Feb. 8 at 7 p.m.  Both games are against UNC Asheville.

 

Each Big South men’s and women’s basketball coach will go Barefoot for Bare Feet at least once during the season to help raise awareness and support the Conference’s initiative with Samaritan’s Feet.  In conjunction with these games, Big South member institution Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC) groups will collect new shoes (athletic shoes only), as well as monetary donations, as a $5 donation equals one pair of shoes.  Also, each time fans text CHANTI to 85944, there will be a $5 donation to Samaritan’s Feet as part of the school-specific texing program.

 

Coastal Carolina has already started collecting shoes for the earthquake-ravaged country of Haiti.  Coastal’s SAAC group collected 300 pairs of shoes in just seven days, and 164 pairs are already in Haiti.  The goal is to collect 1,000 pairs of shoes through community and campus involvement.  Coastal will have representatives from SAAC at all remaining men’s and women’s home games.

 

ABOUT SAMARITAN’S FEET

Samaritan’s Feet is a humanitarian relief organization that puts shoes on kids feet all around the world.  Our team of ambassadors demonstrate servant leadership by washing the feet of all the people receiving the shoes and share with each recipient a message of hope.  There are over 300 million children who wake up every morning without shoes.  They suffer from diseases, infection and many other ailments because they don’t have shoes to wear.  Needless to say, they can’t play sports without shoes.  Our founder, Emmanuel (Manny) Ohonme is originally from Nigeria and grew up very poor.  He received his first pair of shoes at the age of 9 from a missionary, who also taught him how to play basketball.  These shoes allowed him to run and play without getting hurt and helped him get better at sports, specifically basketball.  He started playing travel basketball during his childhood and eventually played high school basketball in Nigeria.  God blessed him with the ability to play basketball at a high level and eventually earned a scholarship to play at the University of North Dakota - Lake Region.  While in school, Manny earned his bachelors and masters degrees.  He had a chance to play basketball overseas, but he turned it down to concentrate on his education.   After graduation, he spent ten years in the logistics business.

 

Six years ago, he left a lucrative marketing and supply chain job to start Samaritan’s Feet, a 501 c3 organization whose goal is to put 10 million pairs of shoes on children’s feet in 10 years around the world.  Samaritan’s Feet was formed in 2003 and over six years later over 2.5 million pairs of shoes have been donated.  Our focus is on children from USA, Africa, South America and the Caribbean. Our past domestic projects have taken us to Indianapolis, Terre Haute, Fort Wayne, Biloxi, MS, Long Beach, MS; South Dakota, Jolo and Bradshaw, WV, St. Louis, MO, Charlotte, NC, Washington DC, Virginia and Maryland.  In addition, we have visited 46 other countries including, Tsunami- Sri Lanka; Romania, Ukraine, Haiti, Nigeria, Kenya, Ethiopia, Ecuador, South Africa, Jamaica, Guyana, Mexico, Brazil, Ecuador, Peru, Malawi, Gambia, and Burundi.