Mount Vernon’s ‘Girls of Summer’ chase a state softball championship Friday

FORT DODGE — Robin Brand talks about “staying where your feet are.” Also known as “compartmentalizing.”

It had to be a near-impossible feat Thursday.

At 11 a.m. Thursday, Brand was at a softball diamond at Fort Dodge High School, hitting grounders and fly balls as Mount Vernon prepared for Friday’s Class 3A state-championship game with Davenport Assumption.

At the same time, 150 miles to the southeast, her 20-year-old daughter — and her assistant coach — Summer Brand was at the Hall-Perrine Cancer Center at Cedar Rapids’ Mercy Medical Center, undergoing the second of six chemotherapy treatments for Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

“I told her I had it all planned out, I’d just come back and be with her,” Robin said. “(Summer) said, ‘No, I’m fine. You take care of the team.’”

Hodgkin’s lymphoma is a type of cancer that affects the lymphatic system, which is part of the body's germ-fighting immune system. Summer started feeling symptoms — fatigue, a swollen lymph node — in May.

“We were coming up on finals (at Central College in Pella),” Summer said Wednesday, after Mount Vernon beat Saydel in the semifinals. “I thought I was just stressed out. I was super tired and worn out.

“The doctors thought it was mono, but I could feel that swollen lymph node.”

Summer was diagnosed as Stage II-A. It’s certainly not ideal, but it could be much worse.

“If it was in my bone marrow, it would be classified as Stage IV,” she said. “When the call came and said that it wasn’t, it was the first good phone call after two months of bad.”

As small towns usually do, Mount Vernon rallied around the Brand family. Steve Brand — Robin’s husband and Summer’s father — is the high school principal.

“The community has been amazing,” Robin said. “It brings everybody together and makes us tighter and stronger together.

“Summer feels so loved ... we all do ... all of the prayers, the messages, the meals.”

And the financial support.

On June 23, a Cause Team benefit was activated with the goal of $15,000.

As of Thursday, the total had reached $17,035.

Well wishes have come from beyond the community. Some of the Mustangs’ fiercest rivals — Williamsburg, West Delaware, Clear Creek Amana and others — have shown support, whether financially or with a simple card with words of encouragement.

“Some of our most respected rivals have been the ones that have shown up for us,” Robin said.

A multisport athlete at Mount Vernon (she graduated in 2020), Summer spent a year at Cornell College, then transferred to Central, where she is a member of the Dutch triathlon team.

“I wanted to stay active, and I was looking for a different program,” she said. “The triathlon team was new and I love running.”

She also loves softball, and when a spot on her mom’s staff came open this season, she took it.

“If this was going to happen, it happened at a good time,” Robin said. “Summer was at home, and with softball going on, there was always something else to talk about.”

The 3A state runner-up (to Assumption) last year, Mount Vernon (35-4) has been ranked No. 1 most of the season.

The girls of summer have been The Girls Of Summer. Even though, at times, it has been Summer who has been the source of strength and encouragement.

“She’s the most positive, the most uplifting person,” shortstop Maia Bentley said.

Added Kameron Brand, a junior first baseman and Summer’s younger sister: “She talks about faith over fear. Why fear something when you don’t know what’s going to happen?”

The camaraderie with the team has been a welcome distraction.

“Sometimes I’m able to forget that I have cancer,” Summer said. “That’s one reason I love being around the team. I played ball with a lot of them.”

The first round of chemo “wasn’t easy,” Summer said. “The next couple of days, I couldn’t get off the couch.”

Yet, she plans to be in the dugout Friday for the championship game. First pitch is 2:30 p.m. at the Rogers Sports Complex.

The chain of chemo treatments will continue, once every 14 days; the last one is scheduled for Sept. 15. Summer was told there was an 85-percent chance that the six treatments will knock out the cancer.

“I’ll get a scan in September. If it’s all clear, I’m done,” she said. “If not, I’ll go through another cycle of chemo and maybe radiation.”

Either way, Summer and the family will be OK.

“It’s still surreal,” Robin said. “But Summer has great faith. Our family has great faith. This is part of a bigger plan. There has to be a reason for this. When the oceans rise, you’ve got to keep your head above water.”

“We believe God won’t give her more than she can handle.”

Comments: jeff.linder@thegazette.com