Dayton Flyers

University of Dayton baseball coach Tony Vittorio, in conjunction with The Building Bridges Program and SCORE International, has introduced a new way to give back to those less fortunate this baseball season. Vittorio unveiled "For the Good of Gloves", a program where the University of Dayton Baseball Program will collect baseball gloves for those in need.

Vittorio received the idea from past travels to the Dominican Republic with SCORE International - a sports missionary organization - where baseball representatives from the United States brought gloves to hand out to kids who did not have gloves. He also noticed that a number of kids at the local Hal McCoy Building Bridges Baseball Clinic did not have their own gloves.

"The University of Dayton Baseball Team is going to collect used baseball gloves from our players, after our camps, and at other baseball venues and give them to those who are less fortunate and do not have gloves. Our main focus will be to donate the gloves to SCORE International and to Building Bridges to distribute at their baseball camps and clinics."

"UD baseball's contribution will have a positive impact on our kids. Several of the kids that attend our SCORE International Baseball Camps do not even have a baseball glove and play bare-handed or with cardboard gloves," said Keith Madison who is the baseball representative for SCORE International and retired as baseball coach at The University of Kentucky. "It's a tribute to Dayton, Tony Vittorio, and the baseball program to have compassion for these kids and to share the game of baseball with them."

"Tony is an animated, take-charge person," said building Bridges Hal McCoy Baseball Clinic Coordinator Marty Grunder. "His team's contributions help inner-city youth learn about the great game of baseball as well as the more important game of life."

The Flyer Baseball Team is also involved with the following initiatives in the Miami Valley: Muscular Dystrophy Association, Christmas on Campus, Dayton Children's Hospital.