AC losing a legend in Davidson
Don Davidson and his Aurora Christian boys basketball teams did legendary damage in a gym too small to be considered to host regional competition.
In the last of his 43 years in education, athletic director Davidson now presides over a Class 2A boys regional, the third boys or girls regional Aurora Christian has hosted in as many years, in a newer, bigger gym bearing his name.
Lettering both inside the gym and on the exterior facade announces the facility as the Donald E. Davidson Gymnasium as proudly as Davidson himself, in a smooth bedrock voice, describes his mission at the private Aurora school.
"I think it's imperative that we not just educate the mind of our students, we also educate the heart," said Davidson, an Eagle the last 33 years after a decade at Yorkville. "Being a born-again Christian, teaching application of the word of God is extremely important to me."
The term "born-again Christian" can conjure negative connotations, but a sincere practitioner like Davidson offers none of that baggage.
He may turn 65 in April, but Davidson is agog over Facebook. Social media helps him stay in touch with or rediscover a litany of Aurora Christian graduates and long-ago basketball players. He gets calls, e-mails or Facebook updates all the time, he said, "the blessing of being a coach."
"Anytime I've written anybody a letter or e-mail, it's signed 'Developing champions for Christ,'" said Davidson, who in 2007 lost his first wife, former Minooka High School sweetheart Stephanie, and has since remarried to a woman he met in church, Sigrid.
Out the Small World department, Sigrid's father was Stephanie's pastor in the 1960s, when Davidson, raised on a dairy farm, first considered the path to Christianity.
"I still feel that the greatest contribution a Christian coach can make is to disciple his kids in the teachings of the Bible and help him to become a solid, strong man of God. That's always been the focus of the ministry here," said Davidson, who chose that path in 1967, the year he arrived at Yorkville.
Such strength may have forced opponents to retreat, cursing, in the face of what Davidson simply called "the winning streak."
After losing in their little gym to Romeoville on Feb. 9, 1988, Davidson's Eagles did not fall again at home until Lisle defeated them on Feb. 11, 1997. That 80-game span stands as Illinois' second-longest home winning streak after Benet's skein of 102 games between 1975-87.
"To me, that's the most amazing thing, that we played parts of 10 years where we didn't lose a home game," said Davidson, whose younger son, Marc, pulled down most of his IHSA-record 1,942 rebounds during the streak.
Davidson retired following the 2007-08 season, and at the May graduation ceremony "the school surprised me," he said, by the dedication of the new gymnasium.
It couldn't have surprised many.
Davidson earned an 82-73 record coaching the Yorkville boys before building a 549-304 mark in 31 seasons in Aurora. Davidson's all-time mark of 631-377 puts him among the top 30 winners in Illinois prep history.
His 1990 Eagles went 30-4 and finished fourth in Class A, and the 1995 squad was 32-2 and the Class A runner-up to Normal-University High.
Davidson earned induction into the Illinois Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame in 1995. He said representatives from the Illinois Basketball Hall of Fame have requested items for an Aurora Christian display when the Hall reopens after relocating to Danville from Normal.
It all came full circle this year for Davidson, who will be succeeded as Aurora Christian athletic director by Dan Beebe, older brother of Eagles football coach Don Beebe.
Davidson this year coached a middle-school team at Parkview Christian Academy in Yorkville, where his wife teaches mornings. The gym he used was the same gym he used to coach eighth-grade basketball 43 years ago.
A man like Davidson would say this is not fate or irony or coincidence, that these things happen for a reason.
He's anticipating the arrival of his next purpose.
"I believe the Lord will provide for me something where I can use my spiritual gifts to serve Him," Davidson said. "That's what I'm looking for."
Who you callin' Shrimp BoyIn 2009 some 1,800 hot shrimp entrees got delivered in three hours to a hungry public during "Shrimp Fest" to benefit the Geneva Vikings football program.It's back - "fresh, hot and ready to roll," said Geneva head varsity coach Rob Wicinski. It's the football program's chief fundraiser and all hands are on deck - moms and coaches cooking in the school cafeteria, players themselves hustling to-go containers bursting with six hot shrimp, cole slaw, dinner roll, "a plump 'Viking' baked potato" and special cocktail sauce whose ingredients Wicinski will reveal only under penalty of death.Versed not only in the culinary arts but in the fields of paleontology and marine biology as well, Wicinski has yet to see the shrimp catch but is encouraged: "It depends on how good they did in the Baltic Ocean that particular year." "Shrimp Fest" orders much be placed before March 5 and can be picked up outside Geneva's athletic office between 4:30-7:30 p.m. March 12.One thing: What's a "Viking" baked potato? One of those purple taters? Yum.For help with orders call Geneva's athletic department at (630) 463-3810 or Wicinski at (630) 463-3929.