The Cleveland Cavaliers are getting ready to face the Boston Celtics in Game 5 of the Eastern Conference Finals on Wednesday night.
Veteran guard Kyle Korver will be one of the keys to the success of the Cavs. And while he will continue to give every ounce of energy on the court, he will also continue to play with a heavy heart.
ESPN's Brian Windhorst presented an emotional look at how Korver and his family are coping with the loss of Kyle's younger brother Kirk in a video that was released on Wednesday along with the companion webstory.
In March, while the Cavaliers were on a west coast trip, Kirk became ill. He didn't get better, and his parents took him to the hospital, where they learned some of his internal organs were failing. Eventually, Kirk was taken to the University of Iowa Hospital in Iowa City.
"We thought maybe he was a little depressed or something," Korver's mother Laine told Windhorst. "But no one would have suspected that he was that sick."
Kirk moved atop a transplant list for a liver and for a few moments it appeared that his family's prayers would be answered. But the 27-year-old died before the surgery could be performed. As Windhorst writes, the Korver family still doesn't know what made Kirk so sick, and they have to live with the knowledge that they might never know.
Kyle Korver gave the eulogy at his brother's funeral. "You will always have four sons; there will always be four," he tearfully told his parents.
