Photos: Mets great Bud Harrelson honored at Morgan Center dinner in Bay Shore

The Morgan Center, a preschool in Hicksville for young children undergoing cancer treatment, held its annual Great Chefs dinner Friday evening at the Southward Ho Country Club

The night featured dishes from restaurants across the South Shore, with the night’s distinguished guest being New York Mets great and Long Island Ducks owner Bud Harrelson.

Other top donors were also recognized with medals.

The Morgan Center provides “preschool age children who are undergoing treatment for cancer the opportunity to interact and socialize, in a safe environment that stimulates cognitive and social development,” according to its stated mission.

“Children on chemotherapy treatment have a suppressed immune system, and could otherwise risk infection and serious illness by attending typical age appropriate preschool programs.”

Click here for 2012 CNN coverage.

Its founders, locals Rod and Nancy Zuch, not only run the organization, but teach the children in their care.

The couple started the school after their daughter, Morgan, a Bay Shore High School graduate who’s now in college, spent her earliest childhood years isolated from other children while undergoing cancer treatment.

Morgan Zuch has since become an advocate for kids with cancer.

Scroll down for photos from Friday evening by Jennifer Mercurio of Lasting Impressions Photography in Bay Shore.

Top: Nancy Zuch and Bud Harrelson embrace as he is announced as the night’s guest of honor.