Floral Park boys soccer team comes together to support the St. Baldrick's Foundation in a run to the county final

Floral Park assistant coach Chris McKie remembers getting a St. Baldrick’s bracelet in his freshman year of high school. A member of Floral Park’s Class of 2018, he had shaved his head eight times as a kid in support of fighting childhood cancer through St. Baldrick’s.

He knew Aiden Binkley, an 11-year-old child from Floral Park who was diagnosed with rhabdomyosarcoma in 2008 before passing away in December 2010.

“I remember being 8, 9, 10 years old, in my Floral Park soccer uniform, rushing after a game to go to St. Baldrick’s, just to shave my head for a great cause,” McKie said. “Keeping it this strong in the town and having this much support, it’s the coolest thing ever.”

The St. Baldrick's Foundation is a charity committed to supporting and funding research to fight childhood cancer, according to its website. Rhabdomyosarcoma is a soft tissue cancer most commonly found in children and adolescents, according to cancer.org.

Alongside head coach Ahkeel Rodney and the 2025 Floral Park boys soccer team, McKie and his fellow Knights will honor Binkley and those fighting a similar battle with childhood cancer by wearing green backpacks donated from St. Baldrick’s throughout their playoff run.

“It teaches and shows the boys the more important things in life,” Rodney said. “It’s great to do well in soccer and win, but it gives us the platform to do something special like this.”

A medical breakthrough in recent years, aided by St. Baldrick's support, led to the development of blinatumomab, an immunotherapy treatment. When combined with chemotherapy, it dramatically improved the survival rate of children suffering from B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia, the most common subtype of childhood cancer, according to findings by the Children's Oncology Group, which is supported by the National Cancer Institute.

“In our lifetime, we’ve never seen anything like this,” said Lisa Binkley, Aiden’s mother and co-captain of St. Baldrick’s Floral Park chapter. “So, it’s a wonderful thing that these guys are doing.”

Binkley called Floral Park “a small town with a big heart.”

It’s shown in the fundraising done in Aiden’s name, as St. Baldrick’s “Aiden’s Army Fund” has raised over $1.6 million since 2010 and over $62,000 in 2025 alone.

“For everyone that does what they do for St. Baldrick’s and to raise as much money as we have — I think we’ve raised about $3.5 million thus far — it’s a big thing, but it’s a community thing,” Lisa Binkley said.

Kids receive treatment through two 28-day cycles using the same backpacks the soccer team received, leading the team to wear them symbolically for 28 days in turn.

“It’s going to get better because of people like you, by wearing a backpack,” Lisa Binkley told the team Wednesday at Floral Park High School.

Senior captain Declan Lally began shaving his head for St. Baldrick’s in third grade.

“We’d dye our hair green the week before and shave it off the day of,” Lally said.

The No. 2 Knights, boasting a 14-1-3 record, kicked off their first state title defense with a 2-1 quarterfinal win at home against No. 7 Wheatley and followed it with a 1-0 victory in the semifinal over No. 6 Lawrence on Sunday. Floral Park will face No. 4 Friends Academy at 6 p.m. on Saturday at Farmingdale State in the Nassau Class A final.

Floral Park’s own Tommy Glackin, who was diagnosed with rhabdomyosarcoma at 4 years old in 2018 and overcame it after treatment, has joined the Knights as a ball boy for the team throughout its playoff run alongside best friends Ben Skar, Johnny McDonald and Danny Henderson, all of whom had shaved their heads to support Glackin.

“I feel like it brings the whole community together,” senior captain Brady Croon said. “You’ll see a lot of shaved heads, and everyone knows why.”