Sports
Night of Champions returns
Team D.C. unveils this year’s scholarship recipients
Team D.C. Scholarship recipients, from left, Lily Chong, Kyra McClary, Sam Song, Fayra Bonilla and Lisa Chen (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
The Team D.C. College Scholarship program has begun to feel the effects of the changes in sports culture as they relate to LGBT athletes.
As the younger generation is aging into their high school years, the fear of competing as an openly gay athlete is beginning to subside. There are certainly still challenges, but in their eighth year of awarding scholarships to openly gay local student-athletes, Team D.C. granted a record nine awards this year.
Scholarship chair Bud Rorison also points to the groundwork laid over the years by the scholarship committee for the increase in this year’s recipients.
“People finally know about the scholarship and are finding it on websites and in scholarship searches,” Rorison says. “We have had great pipeline high schools over the years such as Montgomery Blair and Wilson, but this year we had a nice presence from the Virginia high schools.”
He is quick to point out that one of the reasons Team D.C. gave out so many awards this year is because the nine recipients all had strong reasons to warrant the scholarship.
“It was tough this time as all the kids were amazing,” Rorison says. “They touched on all the relevant factors such as grades, sports, financial needs and compelling backgrounds.”
In another first for the scholarship program, Team D.C. arranged a picnic at Meridian Hill Park where all the recipients met for the first time.
“It was definitely a bonding experience for them,” Rorison says. “We fully expect them to become the role models for the next wave of kids.”
John Ramsey was born in Missouri and grew up in Silver Spring, Md. During his first two years at Montgomery Blair High School, he played basketball and baseball, but chose to concentrate on baseball for his final two years where he played first base.
He came out to his teammates in the fall of his junior year. He would go on to be named captain of the baseball team in his senior year.
“It was much more enjoyable and comfortable for me after I came out. I felt freed,” Ramsey says. “When it came to talk of girls and me giving false output, the two years before it were awkward.”
Ramsay just wrapped up fall ball at Oberlin College where he finds himself at the bottom of the pile looking to build his way up to being a starter for the baseball team. Their season will begin again in the spring.
“My freshman year is going to be a developmental year,” Ramsay says. “I am going to focus on academics first and the baseball stuff will be secondary. I will still be the best I can be athletically.”
Lisa Chen began her sports career at West Springfield High School in cross country and basketball. She grew up in Bowie, Md., and moved with her family to Springfield, Va., before high school.
She was out to her teammates but struggled with the process at home.
“It was kind of a don’t ask, don’t tell situation and it almost felt like the wrong time for me to be out,” Chen says. “I wasn’t ready for the conversations with my mother.”
Finding support for gay athletes from Team D.C. was “just awesome,” Chen says.
Chen has a signature look of wearing bowties and she has taken that look with her to the University of Virginia. Now in her first semester, she has already joined the fencing club and says that her independence is going to be important during her college years.
“UVA is known for being preppy and I am going to embrace that with all my bowties. I am not going to worry about getting my hair cut too short or hiding my bowties,” Chen says. “I am here to learn and I am looking forward to it.”
The scholarship winners will be honored along with members of the LGBT sports community at Team D.C.’s A Night of Champions at the Washington Hilton Hotel on Saturday, Nov. 7.
John Ramsey (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
Team DC Scholarship recipients:
Kyra McClary
Graduated from: T.C. Williams High School
Attending: Smith College
Sport: rowing
Lisa Chen
Graduated from: West Springfield High School
Attending: University of Virginia
Sports: cross country, basketball
Gabe Perkins
Graduated from: West Potomac High School
Attending: Virginia Commonwealth University
Sport: swimming
Lily Chong
Graduated from: Mt. Vernon High School
Attending: George Mason University
Sport: dance
John Ramsey
Graduated from: Montgomery Blair High School
Attending: Oberlin College
Sport: baseball
Fayra Bonilla-Rubi
Graduated from: Lee High School
Attending: Potomac State College of West Virginia University
Sports: JV soccer, rec soccer, marching band
Sam Song
Graduated from: Poolsville High School in 2013
Attending: St. Lawrence University
Sport: swimming
Jemmesha Parker
Graduated from: Luke Moore Alternative High School
Attending: University of District of Columbia
Sport: cheerleading
Nora O’Leary
Graduated from: Washington-Lee High School
Attending: Loyola University (New Orleans)
Sports: JV soccer, golf, varsity soccer manager, gymnastics team manager
The Baltimore Orioles will take on the Washington Nationals on Friday, June 26 at 7 p.m. for Pride Night at Oriole Park.
The first 15,000 fans will receive an exclusive Pride Night Orioles jersey. The Washington Blade is a media sponsor of this event.
To purchase tickets, visit Orioles.com/Tickets.
Sports
Minor league team in York, Pa., forfeits Pride Night game after some players refuse to wear special jersey
City is roughly 20 miles north of Md. border
An independent minor league baseball team says it is forfeiting a game because some of its players refused to wear a special Pride Night jersey.
The Atlantic League Pro Baseball’s York Revolution were planning to hold their 11th annual Pride Night event Thursday for a game against the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs.
But the Revolution announced the day of the game that it wouldn’t be played. York is about 20 miles north of the Maryland line. The Blue Crabs play in Waldorf.
The rest of this article can be found on the Baltimore Banner’s website.
Sports
Jason Collins dies at 47
First openly gay man to actively play for major sports team battled brain cancer
Jason Collins, the first openly gay man to actively play for a major professional sports team, died on Tuesday after a battle with brain cancer. He was 47.
The California native had briefly played for the Washington Wizards in 2013 before coming out in a Sports Illustrated op-ed.
Collins in 2014 became the first openly gay man to play in a game for a major American professional sports league when he played 11 minutes during a Brooklyn Nets game. He wore jersey number 98 in honor of Matthew Shepard, a gay college student murdered outside of Laramie, Wyo., in 1998.
Collins told the Washington Blade in 2014 that his life was “exponentially better” since he came out. Collins the same year retired from the National Basketball Association after 13 seasons.
Collins married his husband, Brunson Green, in May 2025.
The NBA last September announced Collins had begun treatment for a brain tumor. Collins on Dec. 11, 2025, announced he had Stage 4 glioblastoma.
“We are heartbroken to share that Jason Collins, our beloved husband, son, brother and uncle, has died after a valiant fight with glioblastoma,” said Collins’s family in a statement the NBA released. “Jason changed lives in unexpected ways and was an inspiration to all who knew him and to those who admired him from afar. We are grateful for the outpouring of love and prayers over the past eight months and for the exceptional medical care Jason received from his doctors and nurses. Our family will miss him dearly.”
NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said Collins’s “impact and influence extended far beyond basketball as he helped make the NBA, WNBA, and larger sports community more inclusive and welcoming for future generations.”
“He exemplified outstanding leadership and professionalism throughout his 13-year NBA career and in his dedicated work as an NBA Cares Ambassador,” said Silver. “Jason will be remembered not only for breaking barriers, but also for the kindness and humanity that defined his life and touched so many others.”
“To call Jason Collins a groundbreaking figure for our community is simply inadequate. We truly lost a giant today,” added Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson in a statement. “He came out as gay — while still playing — at a time when men’s athletes simply did not do that. But as he powerfully demonstrated in his final years in the league and his post-NBA career, stepping forward as he did boldly changed the conversation.”
“He was and will always be a legend for the LGBTQ+ community, and we are heartbroken to hear of his passing at the young age of 47,” she said. “Our hearts go out to his family and loved ones. We will keep fighting on in his honor until the day everyone can be who they are on their terms.”
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