North Dakota State’s Relay For Life will be up all night.

The annual event will start at 6 p.m. Saturday and end 6 a.m. Sunday at the Bentson Bunker Fieldhouse. Relay for Life committee member Lauren Ellingson said participants will “stay up 12 hours straight and relay.”

This is the first year that Relay for Life will be held in the Bentson Bunker Fieldhouse. The event at NDSU is over 10 years old. There will be various activities and ceremonies “going on throughout the night to honor and remember those who have fought or are currently fighting a battle with cancer,” Ellingson said.

Activities will include music, a Red Bull pong tournament, a comedy show that will include NDSU’s To Be Determined Improv group, a minute to win it game, grocery bingo, therapy dogs, a photo booth and a karaoke contest. The co-chairs of the event will battle to see who has to get a pie in the face at the end of the night. There will also be food for sale and drinks and snacks later on in the event for participants.

“Anyone can participate in any of the night’s activities as well, even if they aren’t registered for the event,” Ellingson said.

Before the event there is a survivor dinner for survivors who registered and their caregivers. It’s hard to peg how many survivors attend each year, Ellingson said.

“The event is held not only to raise money for the American Cancer Society, but to honor survivors and remember those who have lost their battle, so the survivors are very important to us,” she said.

Relay for Life is the primary fundraiser for the American Cancer Society.

“People all around the U.S. participate in Relay each year, so this fundraiser goes even farther than our NDSU campus,” Ellingson said.

The American Cancer Society uses the money raised at Relay for Life to fund cancer research, providing cancer patients rides to treatment, funding Cancer.org, staffing a cancer information hotline for anyone affected by cancer that may have questions, providing lodging for guests and families who have traveled far away from treatment through the Hope Lodge program and more, Ellingson said.

NDSU’s Relay for Life will also be holding a pre-event fundraiser at north Fargo’s Cherry Berry from 5-8 p.m. Wednesday. Ellingson said an NDSU replica helmet autographed by Carson Wentz will be part of a fundraising raffle. Tickets are $5. Winners need not be present.