ORLANDO, Fla. — A simple smile is a powerful thing.

“Smiling is soothing, it’s healthy,” said Will Lee, UCF football’s director of player development.

So when a group of UCF football players were asked to help make local youths smile, they jumped at the opportunity.

“I didn’t have to beg for these guys to come here,” Lee said. “They were like, ‘Coach we are all in’. ”

“Me and a bunch of my teammates are here to hopefully make some smiles for these kids and brighten their days,” UCF running back Isaiah Bowser said.

But these kids aren’t just any kids. They are warriors.

“Because they are fighting a war every day,” said Dr. Shveta Gupta, a pediatric hematology and oncology physician at Orlando Health Arnold Palmer Hospital for Children. “They have so much going on in their body which they are putting up, and it starts the day they are born ‘til their whole life. They fight a war. They fight a war with sickle cell every day.”

It’s a badge Isaiah Corniff has worn for 19 years.

“It’s the pin that represents sickle cell,” said Corniff, pointing to the badge on his shirt. “It’s a badge of honor for us, kind of a symbol to show that we’ve been through it and we’ve experienced it and stuff.”

Sickle cell is a genetic disease that is not as common as cancer, but people still need to be aware of how serious it is.

“It makes the blood and the oxygen hard to get to different places, to the different organ systems. The damage that happens to the organs starts as early as 6 months of age, and by the age of 50, over half of the patients with sickle cell disease have irreversible organ damage,” Gupta said.

The battle sickle cell patients go through might not be readily visible, but it’s persistent.

“A day in the life of a sickle cell patient cannot be predicted,” Gupta said. “Anything can cause and trigger their pain crisis. They might have planned that they would hang out with their friends in the evening, but guess what, they might go into crisis and they have to go to the hospital for the next week.”

A day to share a meal, take a picture, and celebrate life itself together with UCF football players is exactly what the doctor ordered.

“I’d say it’s pretty special to have people out here supporting us without us having to ask them,” Corniff said. “Just them coming out generally showing that they care about us is pretty nice.”