GIRL VITAL TO TEAM

BROTHER’S LIFE, DEATH PLAY ROLE IN TEEN’S LIFE

Rylee Fincher, 15, is starting her second season as a water girl for the Rogers Heritage football team. Her role of keeping her team’s players hydrated is an important one. Fincher’s brother, Kendrick Fincher, died from heatstroke in August 1995 following a junior high football practice.

Rylee Fincher, 15, is starting her second season as a water girl for the Rogers Heritage football team. Her role of keeping her team’s players hydrated is an important one. Fincher’s brother, Kendrick Fincher, died from heatstroke in August 1995 following a junior high football practice.

Sunday, July 29, 2012

— Rylee Fincher never knew her brother, Kendrick, but he’s still a key part of her life.

The 15-year-old water girl for the Rogers Heritage High School football team helps carry on her brother’s memory.

Kendrick Fincher, 13, died Aug. 25, 1995, from complications related to heatstroke. He suff ered heatstroke 18 days earlier following an Elmwood Junior High football practice.

Now, his sister is preparing to help make sure what happened to her brother doesn’t happen to anyone else.

Varsity football practices begin this week at schools across the state. It will be Rylee’s second year as a water girl for the War Eagles.

Rylee admitted her brother wasn’t her first thought when Paul Wilson, Heritage assistant football coach, asked her to be a water girl last fall.

Web Watch

Heatstroke Awareness

www.kendrickfincher.org

Rylee filled in a few times during the summer and she said it was fun being with friends. Some people asked if she just like being around the boys, but she quickly nipped that in the bud.

“I said ‘Well, they stink half the time anyway,’” Rylee said. “It just seemed like it would be really cool to do.”

Rylee’s mother, Rhonda, was pleased when Rylee told her about wanting to become a water girl because it tied directly into her work with the foundation bearing her brother’s name.

The Kendrick Fincher Hydration Foundation was founded to ensure children have proper hydration during athletic activities.

Rylee said she thinks about her brother at various times.

“It’s a casual thing,” Fincher said. “I think about him like it would really be cool if I would be an aunt. It’s not like ‘Let’s talk about Kendrick for four or fi ve hours.’”

Rhonda Fincher pointed out even though Rylee wasn’t born until two years after Kendrick died, his presence was still near.

“We didn’t clean out his bedroom for seven years, so for the fi rst fi ve years of her life, Kendrick had a bedroom in the house,” Rhonda Fincher said.

Even though the 17th anniversary of her son’s death is in a couple of weeks, things still trigger emotional responses at other times, Rhonda Fincher said.

She and her ex-husband, Mike, were cleaning some of Kendrick’s things out of a closet only a couple of months ago, but were unable to finish the job.

“We got through the fourth box and couldn’t go any further,” Rhonda Fincher said.

Rylee said she won’t play the movie “The Lion King” out loud. It was her brother’s favorite.

Rylee also has helped her mother with promoting the foundation at diff erent events by handing out pamphlets and working in a booth.

Next week, the 5-foot, 10-inch Rylee will hand out water bottles to Heritage football players, who will be working out in 100-degree temperatures.

Rylee said it’s awkward at times, but coaches have told the girls to make the players drink the water.

“You just shove the bottles in their faces,” Rylee said.