Aurora Christian’s game against Chicago Christian earlier this month was a night of celebration. But it was also one that brought a whole lot of emotion.

Just before the game, the school and basketball program recognized the first family of Aurora Christian basketball: the Davidsons.

Aurora Christian basketball coach and athletic director Dan Beebe stood at a podium and introduced Marc Davidson as the first inductee of the newly-formed Aurora Christian Hall of Fame.

Beebe read through the accomplishments of the former all-stater: the stats and records, the leadership and faith, and his courage in battling cancer.

Davidson, who played two years for Lou Henson at Illinois before finishing his career at Trinity International where he was a NAIA All-American and had his number retired, lost his battle with cancer last May at the age of 49.

Beebe highlighted Davidson’s achievements as a player and high school coach, which included eight professional seasons in France out of college and most recently coaching Blackhawk Christian in Fort Wayne, Indiana, to state titles in 2019 and 2021. Just as Beebe concluded his speech a banner was unfurled from the rafters with Marc Davidson’s name and favorite bible verse: Colossians 3:23.

“It was a really powerful moment,” said Matt Davidson, Marc’s older brother and a 1989 Aurora Christian graduate.

Beebe, who said he purposely avoided looking at the Davidson family during his speech to help keep his own emotions in check, said there was an “electrifying atmosphere and buzz in the gym.”

Following a standing ovation, Beebe then announced the inaugural Hall of Fame class would also include Don Davidson, the legendary coach who started the Aurora Christian program, and Matt Davidson, a star player in the late 1980s.

“Don Davidson started athletics at Aurora Christian and both Matt and Marc put Aurora Christian on the map,” Beebe said. “We wanted to honor Marc in a way that is meaningful, with a long-lasting impact on the family. We decided what better way than Marc being our initial Hall of Fame inductee?”

Beebe, who took over the program in 2010, says the impact and affect the Davidson family has had on Aurora Christian “is immeasurable.” The words in describing the influence Don Davidson and his two sons had on Aurora Christian barely do it justice.

“I don’t even know how you would measure it,” Beebe said. “The impact Don Davidson alone has had on the school and the people that have walked those hallways is impossible to quantify.”

Don Davidson, an IBCA Hall of Famer, started up the Aurora Christian basketball program in the late 1970s. Over three decades he turned the program from a start-up to one of the most successful small school programs in the state.

Davidson won 549 games in 31 seasons at Aurora Christian, including two trips to the Elite Eight where the Eagles finished fourth in 1990 and as a state runner-up in 1995. He finished his coaching career, which included stops at Yorkville and Parkview Christian in Yorkville, with 723 career wins.

While he retired from coaching following the 2019-20 season, Don Davidson still teaches at Parkview Christian every day at the age of 77.

As Don Davidson took in everything Friday night, there were a wave of emotions as three decades worth of memories at Aurora Christian came flooding back, including those years coaching his two sons.

“The heaviest emotion came those weeks and that first month after Marc died, but things like this do bring it all back,” Don Davidson said. “It was a very emotional night. So many thoughts were running through my head.

“But as I listened, throughout the ceremony, I just thought about all those days we were all together.”

He also thought about the evolution of the program, building it, sustaining it and all that went into it over three decades.

“I was thinking about those first few years where we didn’t have a whole lot of players or athletes in the school,” Don Davidson said. “Then Matt and Marc, along with their friends and teammates, came along and had success which then inspired other kids in the program. Then there were the younger ones who wanted to be like them and be a part of it and do what they saw them do.”

Matt Davidson, who has been superintendent at Timothy Christian for the past 13 years, said the family has been a part of several ceremonies and memorials honoring his late brother. This one was different.

“First, Dan Beebe did a wonderful job with his speech and capturing all that Marc meant,” Matt Davidson said. “And having so many people back from yesteryear was really neat. But this was probably the best ceremony or memorial — and we’ve been to several since Marc passed — because we were all a part of it and shared in it together.”

Matt said because of that — honoring and recognizing all three Davidsons — there was less crying and sadness during Friday night’s ceremony than previous ones that solely focused on his late brother.

“Those were all about Marc, so there were a lot of tears and a whole lot of getting choked up,” Matt said. “This one brought us all together, with dad and I also a part of the same ceremony. There weren’t as many tears.”

Marc Davidson was dealt a harsh hand. He was diagnosed with renal epithelioid angiomyolipoma, a rare form of cancer, in October of 2020. But his faith was steadfast, unwavering.

He continued to coach while taking on the very aggressive cancer. He rarely ever missed a practice and missed only one game during his cancer fight. And just as he was before the cancer, he was a state championship coach after the diagnosis.

Marc Davidson led Blackhawk Christian to an Indiana state championship in 2019 behind Purdue recruit Caleb Furst. His son, Frank Davidson, one of seven Davidson children of Marc and his wife, Lisa, had a big season and went for 20 points and 12 rebounds in the state championship game.

The pandemic wiped out the 2020 state tournament in Indiana, but Blackhawk Christian and Davidson won their second title in 2021 with two more sons, senior Marcus in the starting lineup and sophomore Jimmy on the bench.

Over the years both Don Davidson and Marc Davidson, with all their successful seasons as coaches, would together remind anyone who asked what success truly looked like and how it was determined.

“What I have said — and I know Marc always said this as a coach when asked how was your season — is we’ll wait 15 or 20 years and see what kind of success we had,” Don said of their joint reflection on success. “We will see what kind of men, husbands and fathers they become and then we will see how successful we were.”

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The Cubs bolstered their catching depth by signing catcher Luis Torrens to a minor-league contract with a spring training invitation, a deal the club announced Thursday.

Torrens’ offensive production slipped this past season, his OPS dropping from .730 in 2021 to .581 last year. The Mariners non-tendered him in November, but their president of baseball operations, Jerry Dipoto, told reporters then that the club would extend Torrens a non-roster invite to spring training if he didn’t sign with another team.

Since then, Torrens has put together a strong showing in the Venezuelan Winter League, slashing .387/.484/.600.

The Cubs already have their regular starting catchers, with Yan Gomes entering the second year of his contract and Tucker Barnhart signing this winter. But the club also knows the importance of depth at the position. Two years ago, the Cubs cycled through eight backup catchers in one season.

Torrens is the most proven of the group behind Gomes and Barnhart. The Cubs also signed Dom Nu?ez to a minor-league deal with a spring training invite earlier this month.

Prospect Miguel Amaya is working back from a Lisfranc fracture in his left foot, which he sustained as he was coming back from Tommy John surgery. But president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer said a couple weeks ago that Amaya was on track to be fully cleared by the end of March.

The Cubs lost backup catcher PJ Higgins to free agency after designating him for assignment to make room for Barnhart on the roster in late December. Higgins cleared waivers but rejected his outright assignment to Triple-A Iowa. He signed a minor-league deal with the Diamondbacks last week.

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HAVANA — The White Sox’ Yo?n Moncada and Luis Robert are among the players signed with Major League Baseball organizations and other foreign clubs who will for the first time join domestic stars on the Cuban national team, officials announced Wednesday evening. The team will play in this year’s World Baseball Classic.

The Cuban Baseball Federation long defended the idea of amateurism and punished those who left the island to seek their fortunes in professional baseball.

But that changed when a program on state television announced the roster of 30 players for Cuba’s national team that will play in the international tournament that begins March 8 in Taiwan.

In addition to third baseman Moncada and center fielder Robert, three players from Triple-A rosters were selected: infielder Andy Ib??ez of the Detroit Tigers’ Toledo Mud Hens, right-hander Miguel Romero of the Oakland Athletics’ Las Vegas Aviators and right-hander Ronald Bola?os of the Kansas City Royals’ Omaha Storm Chasers.

Moncada and Robert will be absent from parts of spring training to participate.

“In the end, we all want what’s best for Major League Baseball,” general manager Rick Hahn said this month. “We’ve all seen the excitement and the energy, the attention that brings to baseball from the World Baseball Classic. So we all support it.”

New manager Pedro Grifol views the players’ participation as motivators for them to arrive at camp in good shape and a good experience playing under pressure.

“Selfishly, in a manager’s first year, you don’t love the idea of him having full-time access — or primarily a new coaching staff having full-time access for those six, seven weeks,” Hahn said. “But in the end, the more important thing is the advancement of the game on a global basis, and we will obviously play our part in whatever we need to do to help. It’s a nice testament to the organization that we do have so many players who are participating.”

Eloy Jimenez is playing for the Dominican Republic and Tim Anderson and Lance Lynn for the U.S.

“Only two of [the teams] can go all the way, so we’ll get some guys back over the course of the first few weeks and just meet that challenge accordingly,” Hahn said.

Also on the team will be former New York Mets outfielder Yoenis C?spedes, a 37-year-old two-time All-Star who last played in the major leagues in 2018.

Two Cubans who play in Japan were picked, outfielder Yurisbel Gracial of the Pacific League’s Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks and catcher Ariel Mart?nez of the Central League’s Chunichi Dragons.

To arrange participation of the MLB players, Cuba had to get special permission from the United States because Washington maintains sanctions on Cuba. Under the agreement, those players are barred from coming to Cuba to work with the team.

Baseball is the national sport in Cuba but economic difficulties, the philosophy of restricting the movement of athletes and the temptations of professional contracts abroad has decimated the game on the island.

Contributing: Daryl Van Schouwen

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The rise of the transfer portal in college football has been the bane of many high school prospects’ existence.

Most college coaches, impatient in a win-now world, jump at the chance to fill a roster spot with a proven college player rather than a prep prospect.

That’s bad news for high school players who aren’t four- or five-star prospects — which is obviously most of them.

But there are exceptions such as Glenbrook North long snapper Patrick Mahoney, whose recent commitment to Illinois actually was facilitated by the portal.

“Obviously, being a specialist, everything is kind of weird,” said Mahoney, a 6-2, 205-pound senior. “So I knew everything was going to happen pretty late.”

He was talking to schools anywhere from NCAA Division I to Division III, where he could double as an offensive lineman and long snapper. Then, fate dealt him a winning hand.

Greg Froelich, a special teams analyst at Illinois the past two seasons, left to become special teams coordinator and running backs coach at Charlotte. Going along with him via the portal was Illini long snapper Nico Crawford.

“So that kind of opened it up for me at Illinois and I reconnected with them after their bowl game,” Mahoney said. “It’s funny because the whole time I kind of felt like the transfer portal was gonna hurt me. But it ended up really helping me.”

What makes the scenario even better is Mahoney liked Champaign as a destination no matter what.

“Illinois was a place I wanted to go regardless of football,” he said. “My state school, I really like what their College of Media has to offer. As somebody who wants to be a broadcasting major, I think that their program is really enticing.”

He felt similarly about long snapping after taking over the job during his sophomore year at Glenbrook North when the incumbent was sidelined by injury. He went to a camp at Maine South in the spring of 2021 and had an epiphany: “That’s when I started working really hard towards — ‘I think this is my best option for playing elite level football.'”

Mahoney played basketball, baseball and football growing up. But he really fell in love with the latter sport when his dad Pat was athletic director at Loyola and Patrick was a ball boy for the Ramblers.

That’s also when he first starting long snapping at a camp. His teacher was John Shannon, the Loyola grad who went on to win the 2019 Patrick Mannelly Award as the nation’s top long snapper at Notre Dame.

Now Mahoney gets the chance to be a Power Five long snapper himself. And he owes it all to the portal.

Christian Bentancur picks Clemson

Marian Central tight end Christian Bentancur, the No. 3 junior in Illinois in the 247Sports composite rankings, committed to Clemson earlier this month.The Tigers rarely venture to Chicago to recruit. But Bentancur was too good not to chase, according to Rivals analyst Clint Cosgrove.”At the tight end position there’s so few guys that are of that elite caliber,” Cosgrove said of the 6-5, 240-pounder. “He’s got high level of athleticism and ball skills.”

Offers pile up for Marquise Lightfoot

Recruiting is heating up for Kenwood edge rusher Marquise Lightfoot, the No. 6 Illinois junior. The 6-5, 215-pounder recently added offers from Ohio State, Miami and Wisconsin.Cosgrove sees a high ceiling for Lightfoot as he gets bigger and stronger.”It’s kind of like watching a baby giraffe growing into that body,” Cosgrove said. “Great length, extremely athletic, great kid.”Lightfoot, whose stock rose after he won defensive MVP honors at an elite prospects in Atlanta, has more than 30 offers.”He’s a kid who could wind up being a five-star [prospect],” Cosgrove said.

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