We need your help. I need your help. We need money for research. It may not save my life. It may save my children’s life. It may save someone you love. And it’s very important.

Jim Valvano, the charismatic NCAA championship–winning coach at NC State, delivered these words while battling terminal metastatic cancer. They come from his widely remembered acceptance speech at the inaugural ESPN Arthur Ashe Courage Award ceremony, where he used the national platform not to celebrate himself but to urge viewers to fund cancer research. Valvano’s remarks helped crystallize the mission that soon became the V Foundation for Cancer Research, emphasizing urgency and collective responsibility. The plea is framed personally (“I need your help”) yet immediately broadened to family and community, reflecting his intent to turn a private illness into a public call to action.

The quote is a direct appeal that fuses vulnerability with moral persuasion. Valvano acknowledges that research may not arrive in time for him, but insists it can change outcomes for the next generation—his children, the listener’s loved ones, and strangers alike. By shifting from “my life” to “someone you love,” he collapses distance between speaker and audience, making cancer a shared human problem rather than an individual tragedy. The repetition (“We need… I need… We need…”) builds urgency and solidarity, turning donation into an act of communal care and a wager on the future.