Central Basketball Association

Despite the Illinois Coal Miners finishing the 2018 CBA season with a disappointing 1-7 record, their starting 6-foot-8 forward reached all sorts of positive milestones in his second year with the team. 

Ayron Worthington, who played collegiate basketball at Wayne State College, put up record numbers in the rebounding category, finishing with a league-record 140 total rebounds this season, including averaging a league-high 17.5 rebounds per game. He also put together the best three-game stretch in league history in terms of rebounds, breaking the league-record with 24 rebounds in a game at Fort Wayne, followed by tying his own record with 24 rebounds a week later at Indianapolis, and then shattering his own mark a week after that in the season finale against Indianapolis with 29 rebounds. 

Worthington further complemented his rebounding numbers with outstanding play on offense, where he averaged 15.1 points per game and 4.1 assists per game - earning him 1st-Team CBA All-Star honors for the 2018 league season. 

As a result of his sensational play, and within days following the recent conclusion of the 2018 CBA season, Worthington attracted the attention of many global scouts, and immediately earned his first career international opportunity by heading to the Caribbean island of St. Kitts & Nevis, where he makes his season debut this evening.

With the Central Basketball Association partnering with the Caribbean island of Antigua & Barbuda earlier this year, where the seven CBA players are set to conclude their 5-month stay on the island after the playoffs are completed at the end of this month, Worthington becomes the first of many CBA athletes who will now earn additional opportunities on a second Caribbean island, as St. Kitts & Nevis officially becomes the second island to partner with the CBA in an effort to attract CBA talent to promote youth basketball and development in the region.