Wilson finds she can always come home to Benet

An all-state selection in both basketball and volleyball at Benet, Jordan Wilson will be among 12 inductees into the East Suburban Catholic Conference Hall of Fame on March 12.

“It is an incredible honor, especially knowing who else has been inducted in past years. It’s not even just the players, it’s athletic directors, it’s coaches,” said Wilson, the Daily Herald’s 2002 senior female athlete of the year who went on to play basketball at the University of Wisconsin and professionally in Europe.

Wilson will enter the ESCC Hall with another Benet personality, tennis coach Jerry O’Connor.

O’Connor, named the Illinois High School Association assistant coach of the year in 2010, coached Benet’s boys frosh-soph squad to a 131-13 record with 10 conference titles; he led the frosh-soph girls to a 163-55 mark with six conference titles.

A volunteer in the program from 1991-2011, O’Connor served as the ESCC varsity girls tournament director those last two years.

Wilson, attending a high school basketball game over the holidays, bumped into Peter Paul, her basketball coach at Benet. He told her she was to be entered among the ESCC Class of 2012.

“I didn’t even know,” she said.

She’s kind of hard to pin down. After playing basketball four seasons for three teams in three countries (Spain, Austria, Luxembourg) and named MVP of each, she headed back home after last season. She still had offers, but while our economy isn’t great, “it wasn’t the best time to stay in Europe, either,” she said.

In September the Naperville resident took a job with Marriott; she’s a sales manager based out of Rosemont. Basketball remains in her blood, and she coaches at the choice Union League Club in Chicago, where last summer she had been an assistant athletic director. She also coaches individuals around Naperville and will help with a St. Francis girls team this spring.

“I’m always interested in working with players who want more playing time or want to play in college,” said Wilson, a 6-foot woman who also did some modeling in both high school and college.

She’s well-versed in what it takes to play on both levels. A three-time basketball MVP at Benet, Wilson remains Benet’s career leader in scoring and rebounds, with 1,638 points and 667 boards. She merited national mention by Nike, Street and Smith, and McDonald’s.

With Wilson at center at the Class AA Benet Academy sectional final in 2002, the Redwings’ 51-41 victory over Naperville Central was the last game superstar Candace Parker lost in high school. Benet was 101-26 during Wilson’s four-year varsity stint.

She went on to play in every game at Wisconsin, earning academic all-Big Ten three years, but could have easily played volleyball as well. At the time of her high school graduation, her kills and blocks totals were among the top 10 in IHSA history.

“I obviously loved my experience playing at Benet, and it taught me how to be a student-athlete,” said Wilson, who met her boyfriend, 6-foot-11 Bosnian basketball player Igor Bakovic, while playing abroad.

“Going to Benet, obviously the academics are tough, and it taught me time management so that really helped me in college. It actually made college easy,” she said.

She recalled the toga-clad students who assembled at Benet’s old gym, the lessons in life — and in Spanish, which came in handy — taught by Peter Paul.

“It was such a great, great experience. You can’t compare it to college, you can’t compare it to professional,” she said. “It was cool that it was not only important to us, it was cool to the students and the faculty as well ... It’s just really cool to have such a huge support system around you.”

It keeps getting better

The 2011 season was supposed to be a down year on the gridiron for Wheaton Warrenville South. Coach Ron Muhitch and the Tigers sure fooled us, reaching the 7A title game a third straight year and finishing as runner-up.

The surprises didn’t end there. In February Muhitch received the National Federation of State High School Associations’ Illinois coach of the year award, a certificate he proudly framed and hung on a wall in his office at WW South. Muhitch is chair of the physical education department.

The Tigers also earned an IHSA sportsmanship banner after last season.

“It’s nice to be recognized as a program, and it’s even more of an accomplishment with the year that we’ve had, probably,” Muhitch said.

“I believe we accomplished something that many thought couldn’t be done in Tiger football. That’s a credit to the kids and their families, my assistant coaches and the entire WW South Tiger nation.”

Reaching goals

The third time’s the charm for Wheaton North 2000 graduate Matt Rahn, who on Jan. 30 signed a contract to play for the Arena Football League’s Cleveland Gladiators, coached by Wheaton sports legend Steve Thonn.

Rahn has played with teams, such as the Chicago Slaughter, in the Continental Indoor Football League and the United Indoor Football League. The Arena League is the apex of this set — “a more refined level of football,” Rahn said shortly before leaving for Cleveland on Feb. 18.

“The big draw this season is the fact that it’s been my goal to be in the Arena Football League,” said Rahn, a 6-foot-4, 295-pound center who can also play fullback, tight end and on the defensive line.

“After taking two years off from college (at Hastings College in Nebraska) and then getting back into football it’s been harder to attain, but the opportunity’s in front of me. The hard work’s been done and I finally got noticed,” he said.

His 18-game schedule starts March 12 in Georgia and concludes in Cleveland against the Chicago Rush.

After that, well, it gets interesting.

For the last two years Rahn also has been a player-coach in Brazil. A teammate at Hastings College, Clayton Lovett, married a woman from Brazil, moved there and discovered a burgeoning football scene.

Lovett then contacted Rahn, and in 2010 the two helped the Cuiabá Arsenal win the inaugural championship of the LBFA, or Brazilian American Football League. Cuiabá was the league runner-up in 2011.

Rahn, who at age 30 said he could still play for years in Brazil, will do so until “my body tells me no.” He’s already positioning himself to help budding Brazilian athletes come to the United States to play football. One young man has already put medical school in Brazil on hold to come to the States and play.

Rahn and Lovett are setting up a website with player profiles, articles translated in English and Portuguese, and blogs. Rahn said the process will include finding host families and setting up a nonprofit company that will help the Brazilians get passports and visas and have money for tuition.

“This is all in the early, early stages, but that’s what we see ourselves doing,” Rahn said.

After the AFL season ends in late July, he’ll head back to Cuiabá, possibly to live for several years. Now that he’s attained his goal of playing in the AFL, his excitement is centered around helping others reach their goals.

“There’s not a lot of money in indoor arena football,” Rahn said. “I kind of asked myself what I was doing. And going out there and having the ability to see some of these kids kind of answered a lot of questions.”

doberhelman@dailyherald.com