Jan. 27, 2010

Washington, D.C. - Due to the recent natural disaster, a number of college baseball teams have banded together to "Pinch Hit for Haiti." The Elon University baseball team started the initiative with the goal of raising money to help in the Haitian relief efforts despite being confined to campus with preseason workouts. The team asked every NCAA collegiate baseball team to donate money to the Red Cross. In the D.C. metropolitan area, extending out to all of Virginia and Maryland, Georgetown University has taken the lead in cultivating funds to provide to the Red Cross for relief efforts in the island nation recently ravaged by an earthquake.

"The disaster in Haiti put the lifestyles we lead here at Georgetown in perspective," senior captain Tommy Lee said. "Our team could not be more proud to represent Georgetown University and join the tremendous community that exists in collegiate baseball around the country. We are fortunate to have Mike Melillo down at Elon University start the effort and to have every member of our team contribute. Georgetown Baseball will continue to provide further donations and support for this "Pinch Hit for Haiti" initiative as we try our best to help those in need."

After thinking about the amount of money that could be raised if every athlete gave just $1, Melillo came up with the "Pinch Hit for Haiti" concept. An attempt was made to contact every NCAA Division I, II and III program in the country on Thursday.

"The idea is to pay it forward because we're not in a situation to physically help," Melillo said. "We want to offer our help in any way we can. Although our donations may be small individually, we feel that collectively as student-athletes our support will be of great assistance."

Donations are being made directly to the Red Cross in a variety of ways. If you would like to help out in this effort, you can donate to the Haiti Relief and Development fund at www.redcross.org. You can also donate $10 via your mobile phone by texting "Haiti" to 90999. The team has already raised $269 and plans to add to that total in the following weeks.

"My teammates and I are happy we could raise money for Haiti," GU pitcher Cary Piligian stated. "What happened is a tragedy and our team will continue to support this cause any way we can."

You can also visit the following website for more information on "Pinch Hit for Haiti": http://www.elon.edu/e-web/athletics/pinchitforhaiti.xhtml