A church work group from out of town was supposed to build a wheelchair ramp for a five-year-old boy in southern Ohio. An emergency at its own church forced the group to cancel. In July the football team built the ramp instead.
Maverick Middleton, who goes by Mav, is five and was born with spina bifida. The ramp would give him a safer way in and out of his house. Jackson Area Ministries had coordinated the project with the out-of-town group, and when that group could not come, the pastor at Cornerstone Methodist Church asked his congregation one Sunday whether anyone knew somebody who would help.
Max Newsome, a senior at Portsmouth West High School, was in the room. He had never met Mav. What caught him was hearing that the ramp was on the West Side. "I kind of felt like I needed to do something since this is my community, to help it out," he said.
After church he texted his teammates. They all said they could do it, so he texted the pastor back.
We can help you. Just give me a date.
Ten teammates came. On the day of the project the players reported to football practice at 8 a.m., finished around 10 a.m., and went straight to the Middletons’ house, where they worked until 5 p.m. "We dug the holes and then got to building the actual thing," Newsome said.
The family did not have to pay for the project. Newsome said they thanked the volunteers over and over through the day. Watching Mav use the finished ramp, he said, "It felt good knowing that I helped someone."
Max’s mother, Tiffany Newsome, said the family had been expecting a crew from out of the area. "When it ended up being young men that had just finished football practice from their son’s school, I think it meant more to them because it was that personal connection," she said.
Touchdowns and tackles are nice. Friday nights are fun. But this is what it’s all about.
What was actually missing
Everything about this job was already arranged. Someone had organized it, the family knew the ramp was coming, and the cost was covered. Then the crew could not come, and the only thing between a five-year-old and a ramp was that the people close enough to build it did not know the work had opened up.
One of them heard about it in a room on a Sunday morning. He sent a few texts. Eleven high school players finished the job by five o’clock.
That is usually the shape of it, and it is the reason we built MeetaNeed. The help is often a few miles away and already able. What is missing is that nobody has said out loud what is needed. It went the same way on Mackinac Island, where a fire emptied a wedding reception and the people who happened to be nearby carried the dinners down the street.
Where this story comes from
Originally reported by Landen Puckett for the Portsmouth Daily Times, published July 28, 2026 and updated July 29, 2026. Retold here with the details as that report gives them.
