Local High School Basketball Team In Eldon, Iowa Surprised With An Incredible Makeover Of Their 30-Year-Old Locker Room

ELDON, Iowa, Sept. 17, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- BAND, a free and robust communication platform widely utilized by high school sports teams, cheer squads, marching bands, as well as other after-school activities, partnered with Mustache, a Cognizant-owned award-winning creative content agency, to develop an original online series titled 'Surprise High School Makeovers.'

BAND believes in the importance of after-school activities and the positive impact it can have on students. "We wanted to give back to our users in a way that would impact them in a positive, lasting way. So, we came up with the surprise makeover idea," said Brian J. Yook of BAND.

The Cardinal Comets are a basketball team in Eldon, a small city of 950 in the Midwestern state of Iowa. The team's locker room was in very bad shape - poor lighting, run-down furnishing, and rusty-dented lockers. Students nicknamed it 'The Dungeon.' It certainly was not a place that said 'you are important' to the students.

Boy's Basketball Head Coach Michael Strasko wanted to change that. He found a way by teaming up with BAND. Coach Strasko and the Comets are a longtime user of the BAND app, which they use to communicate as a team every day. Coach Strasko nominated his team's story to BAND with a video of their old locker room and was selected by BAND.

Over a short five-day period, BAND, Coach Strasko, as well as members of the Eldon community came out to help with the renovation, all while keeping it a secret from the students! There were bumps along the way. But every time, the close-knit Cardinal community came together to keep the renovation on schedule. Everyone wanted to lend a hand in providing the students with an experience they would never forget. Coach Strasko was able to quickly reach out to members of the community through BAND.

Coach Strasko is a caring coach that always pushes his players to become the best they could be. He has impacted his players and the Cardinal basketball program tremendously in the past few years. "I see these guys as my own," said Coach Strasko. "A lot of these guys have seen hard times already. They deserve to have things go right." 

On the final day, the brand new space was revealed to the players and they were ecstatic.

"No way, wow!", "That is a transformation!" exclaimed the students of Cardinal High School when their brand-new locker room was revealed to them as a surprise. "I'm definitely going to remember this for the rest of my life," said Dawson, who plays center for the Comets. The space was transformed into an NBA-style locker room with new furnishings, new paint, new flooring, and bold graphics and colors that represented the team in proper fashion.

"This project was definitely one of the most challenging, but also rewarding ones our team has worked on," said Alyson Shumeyko of Mustache. "While pulling off a surprise renovation at a high school in Iowa from our homes in New York was no easy task, seeing the genuine shock and gratitude on these students' faces made all the hard work worth it."

BAND and Mustache documented the makeover through a dynamic combination of recorded video calls, staged interviews, and on-the-ground, behind-the-scenes video footage. 

"I think this renovation is going to really impact kids, we want them to be proud of themselves and to believe in themselves," said Athletic Director Chris Becker, who is also a parent of one of the team's players. The renovated locker room is a new symbol of the team's trail-blazing future ahead and the change that is possible when everyone works together. "I want to say thank you to BAND because this is a life changer for many of my kids," said Superintendent Joel Pedersen. 

"We're thrilled to provide the Cardinal Comets basketball team with a locker room space that they can be proud of. We will always be rooting for the Comets. GO COMETS!" Brian added. 

The full-length video can be viewed here: https://bit.ly/2GBIelC. 'Surprise High School Makeover' was directed by Danny Jordan of Extreme Makeovers: Home Edition and produced by Mustache.

About BAND
The BAND app is a versatile group communication platform that provides teams and groups with a private online space where they can chat, share, and organize together. BAND's vision is to provide the best group communication experience possible by always listening to users and constantly evolving the service. BAND has been downloaded more than 100 million times, used by more than 300,000 leaders worldwide, and is available in eight languages. BAND is a free platform and is available on Android, iOS, and desktop web. Download the BAND app here: https://go.onelink.me/d0IL/8b57399e

About Mustache 
Mustache is content — Scripted, Unscripted, Live Action, Animation, Short Form, Long Form, TV, Social Media, Commercial, Branded Content and beyond. Founded in 2010 and headquartered in Brooklyn, NY, Mustache is staffed with a passionate and diverse collection of multi-hyphenate creators and doers. The agency is uniquely calibrated to craft soup-to-nuts, visually stunning, imaginative, thoughtful, hilarious content and campaigns for any platform. Born of an instinct to buck tradition and institutional bloat, Mustache's energized team is designed to contend with the biggest dinosaurs in the advertising, digital and entertainment industries. Learn more about Mustache at www.MustacheAgency.com and follow along on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. 

SOURCE Mustache Agency

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