1,000 still needed to bleed blue: UK falls behind UT in blood drive competition

By Courtney Thomas

UK is looking to defeat an Southeastern Conference rival in more than just football.

Monday marked the start of Big Blue Crush, a weeklong blood drive versus the University of Tennessee, in hopes of increasing the blood supply for the upcoming holidays.

“Our goal this year is to finally get an adequate amount of blood supply for the holiday season,” said Stephanie French, executive director of marketing and communications at the Kentucky Blood Center. “We have not collected the necessary blood for the holiday season in 10 years, so (we are) really trying to raise awareness about this issue.”

UK led the competition until Thursday, when Tennessee ended with 2,650 pints versus UK’s 2,610 pints. The blood center still needs at least 1,000 donors to win the drive. The final results will be announced Friday.

Despite Thursday’s decline, the blood center recorded a significant increase in donations throughout the week, resulting in a need for more staff at the center.

“The numbers have picked up a lot since last year, so we had to add a higher volume of workers to keep up with them,” French said.

Winning the competition is not the only reason students are waiting in long lines to donate blood.

“I choose to donate because I can,” said Nicolas Posten, a mining engineering freshman. “There’s nothing better than knowing I saved lives.”