The Dayton Flyers paid tribute to late center Steve McElvene today on Twitter and Instagram. He would have turned 21 today.
“Happy Birthday Big Fella,” senior point guard Scoochie Smith wrote on Instagram. “I know u up there dancing for ya bday.”
Seniot guard Kyle Davis wrote on Instagram, “Happy birthday lil bro. You truly touched all our hearts in some type of way and you’ll never be forgotten but dance away in heaven like the old times because we all will be together partying in heaven with you one day. Miss you bro.”
McElvene died May 12 at his family's home in Fort Wayne, Ind., days before returning to campus for the start of the first summer session at UD. A coroner's report in August revealed the cause of death to be hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, or an enlarged heart.
McElvene’s family and friends and some of his teammates celebrated his birthday last weekened in Fort Wayne.
One of those teammates was senior Charles Cooke, who said in July of his late teammate, "He had a ton of potential. It's just tragic. We all think the same thoughts when it comes to something like that. It's sad, but at the end of the day, I feel like I'm doing himself and myself a disservice if I think about it that way. I had too many great moments with Steve to just be sad. I'm not going to sit there and look at it and hold my head down and be sad all the time. I'm going to still feed off the memories I have of Steve."
