Football team hosts Plant-O-ween
Running towards a bowl of candy is one of the many children that attended Plantoween. In this event every group of players had their own game so that the children could have fun while also receiving candy.
The football team hosted the second annual Plant-O-ween at Dad’s stadium on Oct. 31 for kids in the South Tampa community.
“Not only getting to see the smile on the kids’ faces when we were giving out candy, but also being able to play games with them out of the field during the whole thing really made it a great experience for us and the kids,” senior football player Tucker Gleason said about last year’s event.
Gleason helped to lead in organizing the event again. Gleason said it is a great way to give back to the South Tampa community.
“It’s very important for us to be a part of the community for a couple of reasons,” Gleason said. “Every home game on Friday nights, the community comes out and packs Dad’s Stadium to support us, so giving back and supporting the community is really important to keep that relationship going.”
The tradition was first started last year by Coach Robert Weiner.
“I actually had the idea years ago and have been trying to find a way to implement it,” Weiner said. “Last year was the first year, and we look forward to continuing it further as we go along.”
Weiner said that even though the tradition is new, every year it has changed and more people have attended as well as participated in the event. The goal of the event is to make a nice place for kids in the community to come on Halloween, Weiner said.
“A lot of little kids in the neighborhood come to Plant football games and look up to the players,” Weiner said. “We want to make sure that they’re in a great environment.”
The event was held on Halloween from 5-6:30 p.m. The football players handed out candy and played games with the kids that showed up to the event.
“It was really an awesome experience for me,” Gleason said. “Not only getting to see the smile on the kids’ faces when we were giving out candy, but also being able to play games with them out of the field during the whole thing really made it a great experience for us and the kids.”