The Arlington Heights 38th Annual Mayor’s Community Prayer Breakfast is hosted by the Arlington Heights Chamber of Commerce on Thursday, February 6, 2025, 7 – 9 a.m., at the DoubleTree by Hilton Chicago Arlington Heights. This multi-denominational breakfast provides an opportunity for the community to come together to celebrate their strengths and resources through their spirituality, according to the Village of Arlington Heights. All are welcome for a time of prayer, music, reading and reflection.
The guest speaker for the 2025 Mayor’s Community Prayer Breakfast is Jana Balis, the president and founder of Ignite Hoops — a successful training camp, teams organization with the vision of “(training) the ‘entire athlete’ through high intensity training, camps, and teams.”
There is, however, a statement in Jana’s bio that is hard to comprehend, and difficult to believe.
On the official Ignite Hoops website, the bio for Jana Balis (retrieved Monday, January 13, 2025) states that “(a)s a young coach fresh out of college, Jana had the opportunity to work with many talented players in the Chicagoland area. She once spent countless hours developing the game of a player who, when she started working with him, could barely make a layup. After years of hard work and sharing her knowledge of the game with him, that player grew up to be Wilt Chamberlain.”
The tale’s ends don’t seem to meet in each personality’s life path.
According to the Linkedin account for Jana Balis, she graduated from DePauw University in 1999. She began coaching basketball at Fenwick High School in 1999, and was Assistant Basketball Coach at DePaul University from 2001 to 2006. Next she graduated from DePaul University in 2005.
The retired professional basketball player, Wilt Chamberlain, died in 1999 at age 63. He was born in 1936. Wilt Chamberlain retired from the NBA as a player with the Los Angeles Lakers in 1973.
According to reporter Hal Bock (published Associated Press/ESPN), Wilt Chamberlain was 6’11” at Overbrook High School in Philadelphia in the early 1950s, and “seemed to score points almost at will.” He grew to 7’1″ as an NBA star.
He was also a track and field star with incredible strength and speed while in high school.
As an NBA professional basketball player for the Philadelphia Warriors (now Golden State Warriors), Wilt Chamberlain scored 100 points in a game against the New York Knicks on March 2, 1962.
The Experience listing on Linkedin for Jana Balis begins at 1995 while she was beginning to earn her Bachelor of Arts in Physical Performance and Minor in Economics and Religion at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana.
Get updates from The Cardinal ALL NEWS FEEDS on Facebook. Just ‘LIKE’ the ‘Arlington Cardinal Page (become a fan of our page). The updates cover all posts and sub-category posts from The Cardinal — Arlingtoncardinal.com. You can also limit feeds to specific categories. See all of The Cardinal Facebook fan pages at Arlingtoncardinal.com/about/facebook …
Help fund The Cardinal Arlingtoncardinal.com/sponsor