Cattle Classic basketball tournament raises funds, food for local charities
By Kai Olbrich
This article is featured in the December print issue of the Sower newspaper.
The Cattle Classic held each year is more than just a basketball tournament; it is a community event and fundraiser that has been collecting food for those in need for 25 years.
Ryne Seaman, president and CEO of Cattle Bank and Trust, helped begin the tournament to showcase Seward and help the community.
“When I first met with university leadership over 25-years ago to discuss the possibility of creating and sponsoring this tournament, the original goals of the Classic were to further enhance the partnership between the two entities [Cattle and Concordia], bring fans and visitors to Seward and to the campus to showcase both, and finally to involve the community in the activities surrounding the event,” Seaman said.
Those activities include a basketball clinic for kids in grades three to five, put on by the Concordia University men’s and women’s basketball teams. They also facilitate a canned food drive in area schools, where class winners earn a pizza party. People who attend the Cattle Classic Basketball Tournament are also able to pay their entry fee by donating cans of food as well as the traditional cash payment method.
The food and proceeds are donated to local food banks to help those in need in Seward County. The bulk of cans and money raised are donated to Blue Valley Community Action Food Pantry. Other food pantries that receive a portion of the proceeds include FoodNet at Seward United Methodist Church, Christ’s Cupboard at St. John Lutheran Church and Our Redeemer Lutheran School Little Learners Program in Staplehurst.
“This year’s Classic alone raised 10,171 cans of food and $2,963 in support of area food pantries. Since inception, the Cattle Classic has raised 153,607 cans of food and $42,094 in cash for people in need within Seward County,” Seaman said.
Debbie Aegerter, coordinator of the Blue Valley Community Action in Seward, said the Cattle Classic, which took place Nov. 1-2 this year, is its largest food drive of the year.
“It takes a lot of people to help me go through it,” she said.
Aegerter is thankful for the generosity of the community but needs help organizing all of the food that Blue Valley receives.
“You have to look at each individual can item and at the expiration date,” Aegeter said. “And then you first put it in a big tote with others in the same year, and then you box everything up. Like corn goes in a box of corn by itself, green beans, peas, carrots, pears, peaches. You have to box all that up in the individual boxes. So that takes a lot of time.”
One need that Aegerter identified in Blue Valley’s inventory is personal care items. She said that sometimes people just don’t think about those items.
“We can always use personal hygiene products. People sometimes don’t think about, like, toilet paper, tissues, right? Shampoo, conditioner, and things like that too,” Aegerter said.
Seaman said the Classic tournament and food drive fit perfectly with the core values of Cattle Bank and Trust, and give opportunities to practice servant leadership.
“One of the core values of Cattle Bank & Trust is community service and this is one of the many events, activities, and programs that we as a bank sponsor throughout the year,” he said.
“I am a firm believer in servant leadership that teaches that a leader must first learn how to serve before leading,” he added. “Whether it is the food drive, the basketball clinic, or the support of the area food pantries there are a number of ways that employees, community members, and students can become involved and support the Cattle Classic, thus fulfilling the ideal of servant leadership in big or small ways.”
One business that helps make the food drive a success is Pac-N-Save Grocery, which matched every can of food collected for the 2024 tournament. Seaman is grateful to the store and all of the people and organizations who help to make the Cattle Classic a success year after year.
