The first Sunday of November can mean only one thing for the more than 200 student-athletes from The College at Brockport: It’s time for the annual community-wide leaf raking project.

On a calm, overcast Sunday afternoon, members of the Golden Eagles’ 23 varsity sports teams banded together to help Brockport residents with cleaning up their yards of leaves during the State University of New York Athletic Conference’s (SUNYAC) fourth-annual leaf raking project.

Senior Tom McCormick (Utica, NY/Utica Notre Dame), an infielder on the baseball team, has raked the same three houses all four years at Brockport. Along with 20-25 of his baseball teammates, McCormick spent two hours raking that Sunday, and said the community service project helped Brockport's athletes feel more connected to their community.

“You get to see the same people year after year, and you get to know them, which is cool,” McCormick said of the project, which is run through Brockport’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC).

“It’s something we’ve done every year since I’ve been here, and it’s something nice to do for them. They know our names and faces, and they couldn’t have been more thankful for the help. In the spring, they’ll come out and watch our games, which lets us catch up, so it’s nice to have that relationship with them.”

This year, more than 200 student-athletes participated in the leaf raking project, helping clean up nearly 45 lawns in the Brockport community. Most of those lawns belonged to senior citizens.

“It’s essential to be a student-athlete that gives back,” McCormick said. “We take a lot of pride in that. We put a lot of time in the classroom, the weight room and on the field, but we also take pride in our work off the field. It’s nice to give back.”