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2024 Benefitting Charities
Our Mission: Founded in 2009, Building on Love, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) non-profit with a mission of helping families in our community who are supporting a loved one facing a recent life-altering medical condition.
Our Work: We provide a temporary financial bridge to families allowing them to focus on the health of their loved-one and family.
Our Vision: A world where financial stability is attainable while facing a life-altering medical illness.
We are a small local charity supported by a dedicated Board of Directors. Working with our medical referral partners, we assist our families with their non-medical essential living expenses in the weeks after their loved one's diagnosis. We pay bills directly to vendors and connect our families to additional local resources to help maintain their fiscal health.
Capital Cup For Kids, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) non-profit looking to connect athletes of all ages to community service and to the spirit of giving in the greater Capital Region of New York. Through a variety of annual events like the Capital Cup for Kids Hockey Tournament and Capital Cup for Kids Pickleball Winter Classic we are looking to build on the formula in which athletes in their community, playing the sports they love, will develop a passion for giving back to the community.
Capital Cup for Kids, Inc. will partner with local charities in order to provide and give grants to local families in our community who need financial assistance.
Mission of Make-A-Wish
A wish experience can be a game-changer for a child with a critical illness.
This one belief guides us in everything we do at Make-A-Wish. It inspires us to grant life-changing wishes for children going through so much. It compels us to be creative in exceeding the expectations of every wish kid. It drives us to make our donated resources go as far as possible. Most of all, it's the founding principle of our vision to grant the wish of every eligible child.
Together, we create life-changing wishes for children with critical illnesses.
The Capital Cup for Kids is an adult hockey tournament that started in 2010 with 4 local teams and approximately 60 participants. In 2011, the organizers brought the team captains together and asked them to make the event more than a good time on the ice and they discussed the concept of making it a charity event. They decided that the event would benefit the Ronald McDonald House of Albany. In its first year as a charitable event, over $7,000 was raised.
In 2012 the event was moved to Troy’s Knickerbocker Arena and expanded to eight teams and 120 players. A lofty goal of $20,000 was set. Event organizers dedicated the event to the expansion project that was just underway at the House. Thanks to a challenge grant, each dollar raised by Capital Cup participants was matched by Cohoes, NY based charity Building on Love. All told over $27,000 was raised. With the match funds included, the event raised over $54,000 towards the expansion project.
In 2013, organizers added another four teams, bringing the total number of teams to 12 and participant total to 180. The 2013 Capital Cup for Kids benefited RMHC’s Families First Fund. This fund is dedicated to providing direct support to the children/families that utilize the Ronald McDonald House of Albany, Ronald McDonald Family Room in the Children’s Hospital at Albany Medical Center and the Ronald McDonald Care Mobile program operated in partnership with St. Peter’s Health Care Services. Each team was assigned a past or current Ronald McDonald House child to serve as their honorary captain.
In 2014, two additional teams were added, and we divided the teams into a Master’s Flight of four teams (age 50+) and an Adult B Flight consisting of eight teams. Once again, the event benefited our Families First and Share A Night Fund and each team played for an honorary captain.
2015 once again brought an expanded event, with two additional teams added. Dozens of RMH kids and their families visited the participants and our community rallied once again, raising over $80,000.
2016 once again featured 16 teams and raised nearly $100,000! In what is considered the best moment in Cap Cup history, the captains got together and made it possible for a bone marrow donor from Florida to meet the 5-year-old boy he helped save at the event!
2017 set a new fundraising record of $124,000 and saw an expanded Family Day on Saturday with on-site catering, fun and games for kids and a record number of Honorary Captain visits! Incredibly, one of our Honorary Captains was able to text with Pittsburgh Penguins Captain and NHL legend Sidney Crosby during a game!
Our 2018 event was moved back to our original home - Albany County Hockey Facility and featured 20 teams and raised an incredible $164,000! 19 out of 20 Honorary Captains were able to visit their teams. The Lewis Family made a generous donation to the Ronald McDonald House in Saskatchewan, Canada who was supporting victims of the Humboldt Broncos tragic bus accident in honor of their son Tommy and the Cap Cup Family. Additional fundraising also took place in support of the Broncos.
2019 brought even more excitement and success on and off the ice. 23 teams took the ice and raised and incredible $222,000 bringing the total amount raises since inception to $840,000. Family Fun Day featured a synthetic rink for our guests to enjoy courtesy of CanIce and a huge sand sculpture in honor of our 10th Anniversary.
2020 was to be the best yet! We moved to a bigger facility with two sheets of ice and expanded to 26 teams. The teams set a goal of cracking the $1,000,000 total raised amount. And then - Covid-19 hit! With no hockey allowed, the teams agreed to press on with their fundraising efforts and will continue their work to support great local organizations. Ultimately, the players donated enough funds to fund a Make-A-Wish for a local child and to fund two Building on Love Family Grants (and cover all of the expenses incurred prior to cancelation) bringing their total funds raised to $875,000.
Though the covid-19 pandemic put the tourney on ice in 2020 and 2021, we picked up where we left off in 2022 raising over $165,000 in support of Building on Love, Inc., Make-A-Wish Northeast NY, and Ronald McDonald House Charities of the Capital Region. Highlights of the tourney included 4 very special people being entered into The Capital Cup for Kids Hall of Fame. Billy Hollister and Kevin Kennedy were enshrined as founding members/supporters while legendary honorary captains Eva Scotto and Zach Lamont also had their names etched on the Cup.
2023 was a year to remember! A new record fundraising total of $233,951 was raised by the 436 hockey players who made up our 26 teams. They had help from over 40 mites who took part in our first annual Mites Mania event. These future Cap Cuppers raised over $3,000 in support of a local child battling leukemia!2023 also welcomed our Lexus as our presenting national sponsor; a first for this event!
The world's premiere hockey podcast - Spittin' Chiclets featured the event on a broadcast and donated a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to be interviewed on the podcast to the auction.
Perhaps the biggest highlight of 2023 was the inclusion of Stride’s Capital District Sled Hockey Warriors program. Not only did the event raise funds to help them grow their youth sled hockey program, it allowed one of our legendary Honorary Captains – Lyle Joiner – with his dad Steve helping with the pushing. Later in 2023, The ZamboniKids raised additional funds to ensure Lyle had all of the gear he would need to play sled hockey.
Incredibly, 25 of our 26 honorary captains were able to attend and meet their teams – a new record! The teams also rallied around Anna’s Sunflower Warriors and donated thousands of dollars in wish list items and gift cards to be shared with kids in the hospital across upstate New York.
Once again, Make-A-Wish of Northeast NY and our friends at Ronald McDonald House Charities of the Capital Region also benefited from the event.
