Armani Chaney and his daughter Kalani.ST. JOHN'S, N.L. — When Armani Chaney steps onto the court at the Mary Brown’s Centre in St. John’s, his biggest motivation is a world away in his hometown of Chicago.this season, the 25-year-old's young daughter, Kalani, is living almost 4,000 kilometres away.It isn’t bad bounces of the court or knifing through opposing defences that's been tough.
“She's only two,” said Chaney."So, I mean, she doesn't know everything that's going on, all she says is, 'Daddy is playing basketball.’"Little Kalani doesn’t know where her dad is playing, only that he's doing so in order to provide for her and his family. He hopes that later this season, he’ll be able to bring her to St. John’s to show her exactly where he's been doing something he loves.“It means a lot and she really doesn't know the sacrifices and things that I have to go through,” said Chaney.Playing basketball in Chicago isn’t for the faint of heart.
It’s a town where Detroit Pistons Bad Boy Isiah Thomas, former NBA MVP Derrick Rose, WNBA star Candace Parker and NBA megastar Dwayne Wade, amongst others, first learned the game before rising to prominence.St. Rita of Cascia High School“Basketball culture in Chicago is very gritty,” he said. “It’s not really a city where you can just go, and people are going to give you your flowers.