JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – When the Jaguars take the field Sunday against the Texans they’ll do so with new gear. If you take a look at their cleats each one will be different, unique to themselves and the causes they are choosing to represent as part of the NFL’s ninth annual ‘My Cause My Cleats’ initiative. Long snapper Ross Matiscik is choosing to represent the Tom Coughlin Jay Fund.
“The Jay Fund is a really close organization to me and my heart,” Matiscik said. “Being here in Jacksonville for my fifth season, I’ve done a lot of work with them throughout my years. I find it very fitting to represent them with my cleats this year again.”
“I love them,” Matiscik added about the custom cleats. “Gracielin, I kind of gave her the freedom to do whatever she wanted with them and she put a great little ribbon on with some flowers in the front. The Jay Fund blue colors is awesome with the logo on the side real big and proud for everyone to see. I’m stoked the wear them Sunday.”
Once the game is over Matiscik plans to gift the worn cleats to their designer, 17-year-old Gracielin Hickox. The Jacksonville native was diagnosed with Classic Hodgkin’s Lymphoma this past July — a month before starting her senior year of high school. Since her diagnosis, she’s spent 51 days in the hospital where she started drawing.
“Ever since the hospital like when I got admitted and stuff,” Hickox said. “I would just get so bored that I was like anything will do at this point and then I actually found a lot of joy in it.”
One day when she was at Nemours Children’s Health she was surprised with the invitation to draw Matiscik’s custom cleats.
“I had just gotten my eighth day chemo,” Hickox said. “When they told me that I was actually drawing it and that I would definitely be picked, then I was like excited.”
The drawing process began. Just like a professional artist, Hickox had to brainstorm a design. She says it was nerve wracking at first because she didn’t know what she wanted to create, but then it just came to her.
“We started off drawing the ribbon for it,” Hickox said. “The Art with a Heart guy (artist Dylan Bauer), he was like telling me what to draw. He knew that I liked to draw flowers so I made flowers into the Jaguar print.”
“I think Gracielin killed these,” Matiscik said. “Until cancer doesn’t exist’, that’s a pretty strong statement. I think it’s something that everyone’s kind of working for so to see that on the cleats because I had lost my aunt and my grandma through cancer so it means a lot to me and I’m all for it. Let’s make this thing disappear for good.”
This is the second year Matiscik has partnered with the Jay Fund for the ‘My Cause My Cleats’ initiative. Last season he wore cleats designed by 13-year-old Seth Rowe.
“It’s still kind of shocking,” Rowe said. “It’s like he actually wore those on the field. It’s crazy.”
The Jacksonville native was first diagnosed with a brain tumor in January 2019 when he was 9 years old. Rowe’s cancer returned in July 2023 and went into remission a year later.
“Chemotherapy was, imagine the worst thing that could possibly happen, it’s worser than that,” Rowe said.
While at Wolfson Children’s Hospital, he created his own motto — battle ready.
“I thought that design because it just looked cool and it’s a cancer ribbon,” Rowe said. “The saying is because you got to be battle ready. I was battle ready and anybody else that goes through a hard time has to be battle ready.”
Over the past year, Rowe and Matiscik have created a friendship, which for Rowe is big deal as he is a big Jaguars fan.
“I mean, the courage that kid has,” Matiscik said. “I truly believe he’s an angel. He’s one of the toughest people I know. It’s just cool what the Jay Fund and the kind of relationships you can create from that.”
These are the types of relationships that reminds Matiscik how lucky he is despite the Jaguars season struggles.
“The season’s not going the way you want it to, but you have to remember how blessed you are,” Matiscik said. “To be in this position and there’s children that are battling from serious conditions, right? It puts everything into prospective when you go to one of those hospital beds and you see those children battling. A coloring book or something like that might bring them all the joy in the world and we’re over here pouting about losing some games or whatever the case may be. On the field and off the field, anything that happens in life, it’s just one of those things like it gives you a reality check real quick how blessed we really are.”
Sunday’s game against the Texans is more than just a much-needed win for the Jaguars. Each time the players look down at their cleats, it’s a reminder of who they’re playing for.
“Football’s a game we dedicate our lives too, but at the end of the day it’s not our whole lives,” Matiscik said. “Our whole lives and the purpose to be on this planet is to help others and leave a lasting image and leave it better than you found it. Seeing her name on my cleats, seeing her design, it’s so much more than football and I’m thrilled to wear them on Sunday.”
Hickox finished chemotherapy on October 23 and will start radiation soon. She is scheduled to be completely done with treatment in December. She said after this experience and meeting Matiscik, she is a Jaguars fan now. While Rowe is also doing well and said his experience during the ‘My Cause My Cleats’ initiative was amazing and indescribable.