#LucatotheU: UM’s Diaz sends message to young leukemia patient. Parents are overwhelmed

Susan Miller Degnan
·2 min read
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#LucatotheU is the newest Miami Hurricanes football hashtag that could start trending.

In his nearly 19-and-a-half minute Zoom video conference Friday to discuss Monday’s start of spring practice, Hurricanes coach Manny Diaz spent the last minute giving a heartfelt shout-out to “Little Luca,’’ a 5-year-old Canes fan battling leukemia.

“We cried,’’ said Ryan Raskin, a die-hard Canes fan who was born in Lake Worth and grew up in Bonita Springs, just north of Naples. Ryan and his wife, Ashley, now live in North Augusta, South Carolina, and have three other children: 12-year-old Peyton, 2-year-old Cooper and 1-year-old Claire.

Luca was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia in September, Ashley said. Cooper was Luca’s bone marrow donor in late January, after three rounds of chemotherapy. Luca got sick again two weeks ago, the mom said, and “doctors are considering it a relapse.’’

“I’m absolutely floored by everyone reaching out to us,’’ said Ryan, whose request for UM to acknowledge Luca was facilitated by Brad Tejeda, a contributor at CanesInSight. “No words to describe my gratitude for all of this.”

Said Diaz in the video: “Before I go, I just want to send a little love if I can. We’ve got a little Hurricane named Luca, who is going through a courageous battle right now with leukemia. And the one thing we tell our guys on our team is that any tough battles we go through, you never go through them alone.

“You know, we fight everything as a team. It’s kind of the way we sort of build our culture here and we just want to send, from everybody here in this program, to let Luca know that he doesn’t have to fight his battle alone. He’s got all the U nation behind him and certainly everybody in our football program is behind him. We got a little something coming his way to show the love and support that we have for him. Just wanted to send that out there.’’

Ashley is keeping a diary of her son’s story on Facebook. To follow it and learn more about AML leukemia, go to her Facebook page.