Raptors coach Nick Nurse has his sights set on a unique fundraiser
Posted May 13, 2022 8:47 pm.
Raptors fans have all seen the photos of head coach Nick Nurse walking to or from the team’s airplane with a guitar on his shoulder.
The 2019-2020 NBA Coach of the Year winner has a lot of skills and accomplishments on his resume and this summer looks to add festival organizer to the list.
Nurse, who launched the Nick Nurse Foundation back in March, is planning on hosting a unique fundraiser.
“We will probably do something this summer outdoors,” Nurse tells Canadian Musician Magazine in an interview shared with CityNews. “Maybe make it a little bigger, more of an outdoor festival type thing rather than maybe the indoor dinner and auction regular type of fundraising thing we do. It’s a big event for us, it’s one of our big fundraisers.”
The foundation’s launch and main fundraiser, An Evening of Music In Support of the Nick Nurse Foundation, took place on the same night the NBA suspended its season due to COVID-19 back in March 2020. They have already postponed this year’s event but are looking at other options.
“We may be doing something like Toronto’s Got Talent contest coming up and rolling something out like that and I think that would be fun,” he explained. “We’ve got some really good people we’re working with to get that going so there’s a lot going on, a lot to do, and a lot to look forward to.”
The foundation has three pillars: music, sport, and literacy and Nurse is hoping to bring parts of the program across Canada, including Vancouver. He says the money raised in each city will stay in that city for local programs whether it be basketball or music camps.
“You know when they are done the camp, they’re going to walk out of there with a guitar or drums or a keyboard or whatever they need to continue on in music and then I hope that someday we can kind of bring them back together and show that they’ve grown and been able to play some music together. I really believe that everybody should be involved in music.”
You can read the full article with Nurse talking about his extensive 3,500-plus record collection and which Raptors have the best music skills in the May/June edition of Canadian Musician Magazine.
