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Mostly Cloudy Thousands turn out for Michelle O’Neill Volleyball Tourney
On Saturday, Sept. 8, more than 2,000 people turned out for the 16th Annual Michelle O’Neill Volleyball Tournament, which was held on New York Boulevard and Grand Boulevard beaches and drew 330 teams and roughly 2,000 players.
Long Beach resident Carol O’Neill and her family started the event in memory of her daughter, Michelle, who died of cancer in 1996. Proceeds from the tournament go to the Michelle O’Neill Foundation, which supports families with children who are undergoing cancer treatment.
“Judging from our feedback that we get year after year, people do look forward to [the event] and they claim it’s their best day of the summer,” O’Neill said. “They just enjoy themselves so much.”
Last year, the foundation raised about $130,000 through the tournament, which is considered the largest single-event volleyball tournament on the East Coast. While the tally on this year’s event fundraising is still in progress, O’Neill said she suspects they raised just as much, if not more based on the number of teams.
“The success is not really just based on the number of donations,” O’Neill said. “I consider ourselves extremely blessed that we finished up the event on Saturday without any accidents or negative incidents … To me, the success is when you can leave an event where there are several thousands of people knowing that everybody was safe.”
O’Neill said she felt lucky that Long Beach dodged the rough weather — and tornado — that hit nearby Breezy Point, Queens.
“It was like Long Beach had this big bubble over it,” she said. “I was saying, that’s Michelle carrying a big umbrella over the event. We were very blessed.”
The tournament consists of three divisions: recreational, a four-man competitive division, and a six-man competitive division. Competitive divisions advance to the finals and are awarded trophies. This year, the team that clinched the four-man division title was Metropolis, while Tito’s on the Rocks earned six-man division honors. The award for best team name went to To Kill A Blocking Nerd.
