University of Michigan, Oakland University basketball teams unite to fight food insecurity
(CBS DETROIT) — The University of Michigan and Oakland University basketball teams came together Saturday at Forgotten Harvest in Oak Park to pack more apples for the food insecure.
"These apples that these students are packing today will go out to feed the community, there's over 550 thousand people in Metro Detroit that are food insecure," said Christopher Ivey, chief marketing officer for Forgotten Harvest.
313 Presents helped bring these two basketball programs together.
"We wanted to create a relevant reason for these two teams to clash and forgotten harvest is an amazing force really helps people with food insecurity," said Howard Handler, president of 313 presents.
Coaches helped out alongside the players on Saturday.
"What I'm proud of is how hard they've worked at," said Greg Kampe, Oakland University men's basketball coach. "It's easy to sit here and say we're doing this, but those were some really big boxes and they really worked their butts off to get through there."
And while this competition doesn't count in the record books, Oakland does have this day's bragging rights.
"There's no question we did," said Kampe. "I mean they still got two boxes left and we're done. We're going home."
Saturday served as somewhat of a preview as the Wolverines will take on the Golden Grizzlies in a charity exhibition game on Oct. 20 to benefit Forgotten Harvest. The game will feature many new faces on the sideline, including Michigan Head Coach Dusty May.
"It's going to be fun just to be in front of our fans in the City of Detroit and also it's going to be exciting just to see our team play together," May said. "It'll be the first time they've put on the uniforms and have officials and the lights on, so we're anticipating it."