by Christina Echegaray
The Nashville Predators hockey team, longtime supporters of Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt and its programs, recently presented the hospital with the proceeds raised throughout the year from the team’s 365 Pediatric Cancer Fund presented by Twice Daily.
In a socially distanced, masked presentation outside the hospital, goaltender Pekka Rinne, mascot Gnash and the Nashville Predators Foundation, empowered by SmileDirectClub, recognized the $365,000.20 in donations and in-kind contributions raised.
The funds will be used to support pediatric cancer research, to identify new ways of curing childhood cancer and to deliver these treatments in an optimal way for each child.
In 2019, the Predators organization also announced a commitment of $300,000 over three years to support Children’s Hospital’s Soaring Higher, Dreaming Bigger: A Campaign Against Childhood Cancer.
The campaign is helping expand and upgrade the existing pediatric cancer space as well as supporting research, training and programs.
Over the past nine years combined, the 365 Fund, created by Rinne and former Predators captain Shea Weber, has given more than $3.3 million in donations and in-kind contributions to the hospital and its programs.