Lady Templars play benefit soccer game

for Amber Olsen

By James Tilson

Sports editor

9-26-2019

MANTI—The Lady Templars usually rock the red, white and black, but Tuesday Sept. 17 they wore grey to honor a special lady who has inspired this team with her tenacity and courage.

The Manti High School girls’ soccer team played a benefit game in honor of Amber Olson, mother of freshman soccer player Elsey Olson. Amber Olson is suffering from brain cancer, and is undergoing chemotherapy treatment after having surgery to remove a tumor.

“They’ve done radiation, they’ve done chemo,” said Coach Eleshia Steinfeldt, relating how Amber was doing after the cancer surgery. “The chemotherapy pills are atrociously expensive. Everything is expensive. When you have that kind of therapy, the bills just stack up.”

All season long, the girls on the soccer team have written “4Amber” on their legs in tribute to Elsey’s mom. According to Steinfeldt, the team wanted to do more for the Olson family after they heard about the bills from the treatments.

“There’s a benefit auction scheduled for Nov. 13. But we wanted to honor her, because she’s fighting so hard, for her family,” said Steinfeldt. “We wanted to help out.”

The team wore grey jerseys for the game on Tuesday as part of the benefit. Grey was chosen because it is used to signify brain cancer. The jerseys had “4Amber” on the back, and the numbers were in coral, Amber’s favorite color. There was also a cancer ribbon on the shoulder.

The team took a collection during the game, and the jerseys were available for sale as well. All proceeds will be forwarded to the family.