As a Peoria Notre Dame basketball player fights cancer, he finds solace in the sport

PEORIA — Life, lately, for Dylan Langholf has been anything but normal.

The Peoria Notre Dame junior should be a contributing first-year member of the Irish varsity boys basketball team. He’s a 6-foot guard with a team-first mentality, hard-working habits and a high basketball IQ.

“He’s the ultimate teammate,” PND coach Tom Lacher said. “He’s just one of those kids you want in your program. We’ve been blessed with so many of those (players) over the years. He’s as good as any of those kids that just are all about the team and going to do whatever.

“The young man always has a smile on his face.”

Langholf must have been grinning proudly in June 2023 during a three-day summer shootout in Jacksonville, playing two games a day during that time. With just six PND players available on the final day of the competition, Langholf played masterfully on both ends of the floor. His three 3-pointers and hard-nosed defense were ultimately the difference in the game.

“He won the last game of the summer for us,” Lacher said.

Just two days after those heroics, a cancer diagnosis sidelined Langholf’s basketball journey. He is amidst 42 weeks of chemotherapy for embryonal rhabdomyosarcoma, a cancer found in soft tissues like muscle, blood vessels or tendons. The 17-year-old has completed two-thirds of the treatments and has kept a positive outlook every step of the way.

Langholf family: An extra sense of Thanksgiving for Peoria basketball family

“It’s basically just downhill from here,” Langholf said with a big smile and wearing an Indianapolis Colts stocking cap, last Saturday prior to the PND girls playing Lincoln at Bradley’s Renaissance Coliseum. “I’m looking forward to being done with it, obviously.

“I’m just going to get through this. I’m not going to complain about it because there’s people going through way worse. I’m grateful that it’s not worse.”

Initial diagnosis

From March to around mid-June, Langholf was experiencing gastrointestinal problems by what he thought was caused by some new medication.

“He’s not our complainer,” his father, Layne Langholf, said of his oldest of three sons.

The elder Langholf, who is also the PND head girls basketball coach, tells a story of Dylan having a hernia for four months during junior high and saying nothing. Nevertheless, something was different this time around.

On June 20, Dylan went to his pediatrician to get tested for diabetes after showing many of the same symptoms. Diabetes then was ruled out, but on July 1, the findings from a CT scan revealed that there was a softball-sized tumor wrapped around Dylan’s prostate.

“From there, we literally went that day down to OSF and he became a St. Jude’s patient,” Layne said.

First steps

Once Dylan arrived at St. Jude, he spent the next four days undergoing tests and four surgeries.

Several procedures including a bone marrow scan were done to see if the cancer had spread. But the pathology of it all would take a few weeks, leaving Layne and his wife, Maureen, needing to be patient and praying for the best result possible.

“From all the people I know that have had cancer or kids with cancer, the waiting is the worst, worst part,” Layne said, noting Dylan and his family didn’t find out anything for 12 days. “That’s probably been the hardest part. Just not knowing.”

Things got even scarier for Dylan when he had originally been treating histoplasmosis, a lung infection brought on by breathing in fungus. A PET scan showed two cancerous spots on his lungs. Luckily, the full pathology report came back from the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis with no signs of lung cancer, only histoplasmosis.

“We've never been more thankful for a fungus in our life,” Layne said.

Treatment

The treatment plan for Dylan? Nearly a year of chemo, along with seven weeks spent in Memphis for radiation. Every six weeks, he has five days of chemo in a row. A scan has shown the edges of the tumor had died.

“(The tumor is) contained within all the dead cells,” Layne said, “so the cancer is basically feeding off itself. Like it's not recruiting new cells.”

As of Jan. 10, the tumor has shrunk from 9.7 centimeters to 6.5 centimeters. Although the MRI can only show dimensions, not active cancer cells, Dylan will always have remnants of the tumor.

'Our beautiful girl': Beloved Dunlap teen soccer player loses battle to cancer

One of the biggest struggles, Dylan says, is maintaining his weight. He tries to eat as much as he can, but his body is just continuously burning calories. “I have to eat a lot,” he said.

Sleep has also taken a priority for Dylan. He takes a daily nap after school, then goes to bed around 9 p.m. each night. The rest makes him feel better.

While in Memphis, he got a chance to speak with his counselor, Clayton. When his caseworker asked Dylan what he would tell someone in his situation, Dylan's response was pointed and almost immediate: “You can’t be a victim of cancer."

Living his life

Despite spending time in Memphis and multiple hospital stays, Dylan has maintained an academically strong work ethic, earning three As and two Bs during PND’s latest trimester. He also loves to being outdoors with friends.

“We got really into fishing,” Dylan said. “Basically, every day during July and August, we’d go. … It’s so fun. That’s all we would do.”

Dylan still has a passion for basketball, especially watching his dad’s state-ranked team this season. His playing days have been put on hold, but that doesn’t mean he still isn’t part of the team.

“Just being with the team,” Dylan said. “Just the sense of community that you get. It makes me feel better. I feel better when I’m with the team. Just being around basketball. It is really good for me, I think, and it helps me feel better.”

That quote says a lot about Lacher and the culture he’s built at PND.

“They care about Dylan,” the coach said. “Not because he has cancer, but because he’s one of them, he’s one of their brothers and he’s going through a tough time. They would care about him if he’s healthy, but they’re more dialed in to his needs and what’s really important because of what he’s going through.”

Outpouring of support

Dylan’s Defenders is a Facebook group, that has garnered nearly 2,000 followers, and keeps the community updated with the namesake’s progress throughout everything that is happening. Many local high schools have teamed up with PND to have Dylan’s Defenders Night, raising awareness and money for St. Jude.

The outpouring of support has been nothing short of amazing, according to Dylan.

PND girls basketball: Irish prove resolve one state-ranked opponent at a time

“It’s amazing what everyone has done,” he said. “I knew people cared for me and my family but once this happened, and just seeing how many people really, really cared for us and our family and me. It was amazing.

“… I’m so grateful for the community because I think it makes it 10-times easier just having the community backing you and knowing that you’re supported, and people care about you is really special.”

Being in the public eye, though, is something very new for Dylan.

“If you knew me before this, I’m not an attention-seeker,” he said. “I don’t like having the spotlight on me. When they do (those nights), it was a big change. … I like the information (on the Facebook page) and I like knowing that people can know how I’m doing and how I’m feeling.”

Adam Duvall is a Journal Star sports reporter. Email him at aduvall@pjstar.com. Follow him on X.com @AdamDuvall.

This article originally appeared on Journal Star: Peoria Notre Dame's Dylan Langholf not fighting cancer battle alone