Friends and athletes alike gathered last Sunday to celebrate diversity through a memorial run for Ricky Byrdsong, a former Northwestern basketball coach killed in an act of hate violence.

The fourth annual Ricky Byrdsong Memorial 5K Race Against Hate Run/Walk and Youth Mile was held June 29 at Long Field. More than 900 runners finished the race and another 800 people participated in the walk and youth events. Proceeds went to the Ricky Byrdsong Foundation, which offers diversity programs for Chicago-area youth, including a summer “Not Just Basketball” camp.

“People who come to the race strongly believe that they can in some small way help change the world,” said Mike Adamle, Communication ’71, sports director at CBS2 who has emceed the race the last three years but was unable to attend this year.

Byrdsong coached men’s basketball at NU from 1993-97 and became vice president of community affairs at Aon Corporation, which helps sponsor the memorial race. On July 2, 1999, Byrdsong was shot by white supremacist Benjamin Smith while walking near his home with two of his three children.

Sherialyn Byrdsong, the coach’s wife for 19 years, said the memorial race “celebrates diversity and promotes racial reconciliation,” according to a June 22 column she wrote for the Chicago Tribune.