Super fan battling illness touched by kindness of Clark County girls’ basketball team
When the George Rogers Clark Cardinals play Owensboro Catholic on Thursday night in the Mingua Beef Jerky/KHSAA Girls’ Sweet 16 basketball tournament at Rupp Arena, the Cardinals will have the benefit of a not-so secret weapon.
“Oh, honey,” said Royetta Stamper. “I just love those girls.
And they love Mrs. Stamper, who for 14 years was a special education teacher at the Winchester school, is married to a former University of Kentucky basketball player, and who last October was diagnosed with ALS, or Lou Gehrig Disease.
“I’m hanging in there,” said Stamper on Wednesday. “I can’t use my left hand at all, and my right hand is almost gone.”
Nor has she driven a car since she broke her arm on Oct. 8, but that hasn’t stopped Stamper from being a dedicated fan of not only the Kentucky Wildcats, but both Clark County basketball teams, though it is the girls’ team that has adopted her as an unofficial team mascot this season.
“It all starts with the coach,” said Royetta.
That would be Robbie Graham, who last week guided the Cardinals to their fourth consecutive 10th Region title. Stamper and Graham taught side-by-side at GRC and became great friends to the point where Stamper and Graham’s wife would go to football games together and the children would sit in Royetta’s lap. A huge high school sports fan — Stamper moderated a message board on the Bluegrass Preps site for 10 years — she rarely missed a game.
“When I first moved to Winchester, Mrs. Stamper was one of the first people to reach out to me and my family,” Graham said Wednesday. “She would raise a garden and my bring my wife vegetables. She baked my daughter applie pies. Just a sweet, sweet person. When we found out her diagnosis, we were devastated.”
A native of Ezel in Morgan County, Royetta’s husband is Larry Stamper, a 6-foot-6 forward from Beattyville who played for the Cats from 1969 through 1973, first for Adolph Rupp and then Joe B. Hall. Three years ago, Larry was diagnosed with tongue cancer and during his recovery Graham supported the Stampers any way he could. And in turn, Royetta became not only closer to the coach but his players. “And their parents,” she said.
Now they are there for Royetta in her time of need. As someone who faced health problems of her own for seven years — “I have inner shingles,” she said — she made repeated trips to the Cleveland Clinic in an effort to solve the mystery of her ailment. “They couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me,” said Royetta.
Not that she blames the Clinic, one she brags on to this day. She even went so far as to buy her doctor there a blue “UK scrub” which she says he wears all the time. “I asked one of the nurses if he says a patient bought it for him,” she said. “And the nurse said, ‘Oh no, honey, he knows you by name.’”
Finally, she was diagnosed with ALS, a progressive nervous system disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. The disease has slowed her to the point where she can’t attend all the games she would like, but always listens on the radio, where she gets a shout-out from the announcers.
Then at GRC’s Senior Night last month, Graham made Royetta an honorary coach and had her sit on the bench. Afterward, the players had her pose with them for the team picture. And although she missed the first two games of last week’s regional tournament in Campbell County, she was able — “I wouldn’t say I was able, but I went anyway,” she said — to be in Alexandria for the finals Saturday, when the GRC girls cut off a piece of the net for her.
“I cried,” she said.
She plans on being at Rupp Arena on Thursday night. Larry has been under the weather of late, but she’s made transportation arrangements with a couple of other GRC fans. She’s studied the draw, too, and thinks her Cardinals have an excellent chance of making it to Saturday morning’s semifinals.
She will be there for them as they have been there for her.
“It has touched my heart,” said Royetta Stamper. “I cry every time I think about it. It just really touched my heart that I have such loving and caring people.”
This story was originally published March 11, 2020 at 5:04 PM.
