2025 Honorees of Smith Memorial Playground

Mo’ne Davis

Mo'ne Ikea Davis is an American former Little League Baseball pitcher and former Hampton University softball player from Philadelphia, PA. She was one of two girls who played in the 2014 Little League World Series and was the first girl to earn a win and to throw a shutout in Little League World Series history. She was the 18th girl overall to play and the sixth to get a hit. She was also the first Little League baseball player to appear on the cover of Sports Illustrated as a Little League player.

In 2008, Steve Bandura, who is program director for Marian Anderson Recreation Center in South Philadelphia, observed Davis playing football with her cousins and older brother. He noticed that "she was throwing this football in perfect spirals, effortless and running these tough kids down and tackling them." Bandura asked her if she would like to come to a basketball practice. When she came to practice, Bandura asked her to watch the practice, but she wanted to participate. Bandura told The Philadelphia Tribune that "Her eyes were just glued on the drill and, when it came time for her turn, she went through it like she has been doing it a thousand times. I just knew right then." According to The Philadelphia Tribune, Davis became Bandura's best basketball player and the only girl on the team. She also began playing and excelling at baseball and soccer.

Bandura, together with other sponsors, helped Davis transfer to Springside Chestnut Hill Academy. Her mother, Lakeisha McLean, told The Philadelphia Tribune that she was unaware that her daughter was so athletic. In 2011, she was a point guard in basketball, a pitcher, shortstop, and third baseman in baseball, but she revealed that she started pitching when she was a substitute from outfielder, and mid-fielder for soccer.

As of August 2014, while notable as a Little League pitcher, she considered basketball her primary sport. She aspired to become a WNBA player, and had expressed desire to play college basketball for the UConn Huskies of the University of Connecticut, despite not being formally recruited, and follow in the footsteps of Maya Moore, a UConn alumna who went on to play in WNBA.

In 2015, she released a memoir, written with Hilary Beard, Mo'ne Davis: Remember My Name. That year she also teamed up with the brand M4D3 (Make A Difference Everyday) to design a line of sneakers for girls, with some of the proceeds going toward the Plan International's Because I Am a Girl initiative, which has the goal of helping to lift four million girls in the developing world out of poverty.

In 2018, she committed to Virginia's Hampton University to play softball starting in the fall of 2019. Davis made her debut for the Lady Pirates on February 8, 2020, going 1-for-3, driving in two runs, and recording a sacrifice in Hampton's 15–4 win over North Carolina A&T. She ended the season third on the team in chances (77) and putouts (46) and had a .333 batting average with three multi-hit games and two multi-RBI games. Davis started as an infielder in 49 of the Pirates' 55 games and her batting average dipped to .219 with six doubles, 24 runs scored (2nd on the team), 16 RBI, and a perfect 8-for-8 in steals on the basepaths.

Despite playing in only two seasons for the Hampton University softball team, Davis was not on the Pirates' 2023 roster.

In 2023, Davis began her graduate studies at Columbia University.