Alena Sharp grinded out an even-par round Thursday at the Cambia Portland Classic, but she couldn’t have left Columbia Edgewater Country Club feeling better if she were atop the leaderboard.
Sharp was teary-eyed reading a text on her cell phone after the round, when she learned her act of kindness at the CP Women’s Open last week won something special for a still grieving Canadian community.
A hockey player growing up in Canada, Sharp wanted to help Humboldt, a city in Saskatchewan devastated last April when a semitrailer truck collided with the Humboldt Broncos junior hockey league team bus. Sixteen people on the bus were killed and 13 others injured.
Full-field scores from the Cambia Portland Classic
Sharp paid tribute to the Broncos playing in Saskatchewan last week, carrying a golf bag with the team logo and colors on it. She scribbled “16” on her golf balls.
The bag attracted so much attention, it was put up for charity auction this week. Sharp learned Thursday that the bag raised $19,000 for the Jim Pattison Children’s Hospital Foundation, with the proceeds going to help purchase a much needed isolette machine for Humboldt Hospital. It’s an incubator used to treat premature newborns.
“It made me cry and gave me goosebumps,” Sharp said upon hearing what the bag won for Humboldt. “Just unbelievable. I was at a loss for words. And so happy that we could raise that much money in awareness. And be able to give it back to the Humboldt children. That’s just something that’s made my year, really.”
