Heavy hearts on display

DIXON – The Sauk Valley Community College Skyhawks men’s basketball team opened the season with heavy hearts Friday night.

The Skyhawks took the court less than a week after learning about the passing of JaMario Dunlap, who was Sauk Valley’s starting center and winner of the team’s Most Improved Player award last season as a freshman.

Dunlap was going to take this year off and return to Sauk next season. But, last Sunday in his hometown of Milwaukee, Dunlap collapsed during a recreation league tournament and died.

The Skyhawks will honor Dunlap by wearing his No. 42 on their home jerseys. They also want to keep the No. 42 in uniform this season. Freshman Ethan Kruse has the honor of wearing the number.

“We were playing for something more with the loss of a teammate from last year,” said SVCC sophomore Rian Nailor, one of three returning Skyhawks who played with Dunlap a year ago. “We really wanted to come out and play hard and play for his family.”

Nailor was taken aback by the news.

“Sunday night when I found out, it didn’t really hit me,” he said. “I just couldn’t believe that it happened. I lost a good friend.

“We all want to play hard for him. It was a complete shocker and just really sad. We’re going to use his memory to inspire us the whole year.”

Sauk head coach Russ Damhoff echoed those sentiments.

“It’s been a long week,” he said. “We’re going to go up [to Milwaukee] Saturday morning to JaMario’s funeral.

“It’s just a really tough situation. It’s one of those things as a coach you don’t ever want to deal with. It was a shock.”