Cavaliers greats fond of Greater Akron ties 30 years after move from Richfield Coliseum

CLEVELAND — Craig Ehlo allowed at least two middle-school students who lived in his old Fairlawn neighborhood to fulfill academic assignments by shadowing him during work.

Trick-or-treaters who flocked to Brad Daugherty's former Hudson house received king-size candy bars and T-shirts emblazoned with a cartoon version of the 7-footer.

And summertime pickup basketball games at Valley Vista Park in Cuyahoga Falls included Mark Price, Ehlo and other Cavaliers players who lived nearby at Timber Top Apartments.

The Cavs were entrenched in Summit County decades ago because they practiced and played at the Richfield Coliseum from 1974-94 after spending their first four seasons of existence at Cleveland Arena.

“There was a lot of us that called Akron home,” Ehlo said.

The 30th anniversary of the Cavs moving their home games from the Coliseum in Richfield Township to Gund Arena in downtown Cleveland is this year. The team's final game in the Coliseum was on May 3, 1994, and its regular-season debut in the venue now called Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse was on Nov. 8, 1994.

The Coliseum is long gone, demolished in 1999, but the special connections the Cavs built with Greater Akron and its citizens have not been forgotten.

One legendary player from the last Cavs teams to call Richfield home never left. Larry Nance Sr. and his wife, Jaynee, fell in love with the area and have lived in the same Bath Township house for 33 years.

“We would never change that,” Nance said.

The Beacon Journal interviewed Ehlo, Daugherty, Price and Nance along with Lenny Wilkens and Wayne Embry, the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Famers who coached and constructed the late 1980s and early 1990s Cavs teams responsible for Richfield often rocking during the franchise's final years at the Coliseum.

Here are some of their memories from those days.

If you lived in Greater Akron when Craig Ehlo played for the Cleveland Cavaliers, you probably saw him out and about

Acme. Diamond Grille. Mustard Seed.

Akron staples roll off the tongue of Ehlo, a shooting guard who joined the Cavs on a 10-day contract in January 1987 after his NBA career began with the Houston Rockets.

Ehlo and his wife, Jani, lived at Timber Top and Eagles' Chase condominiums in Akron while he played for the Cavs on one-year deals. After the club traded Ron Harper in 1989, a move Wilkens laments to this day, Ehlo received a multiyear contract and bought at house on Bancroft Road in Fairlawn.

Cavs fans frequently ran into Ehlo because he had young children at the time and often tried to entertain them with activities. Walks at Summit Mall in Fairlawn and the Nature Realm in Akron were common. The family went on bicycle rides — with dad hauling the kids in a bike trailer — and the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad because of a recommendation by Joe Tait, the late Cavs broadcasting icon.

Ehlo asked if the McDonald's in Akron's Merriman Valley still features a large aquarium (it doesn't) because his kids used to enjoy it. The second of his three children, Austin, was born in Akron General Medical Center.

Ehlo, 62, didn't golf until he began participating in charity outings through the Cavs. He and Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr, a Cavs point guard from 1989-92, regularly played together at Fairlawn Country Club. Ehlo took his parents, Bill and Emadene, bowling at AMF Riviera Lanes in Fairlawn because they had watched tournaments held there on TV.

Ehlo also has quirky stories about his time in Northeast Ohio.

Ehlo said on two separate occasions in the late 1980s he found former Cavs teammates Johnny Newman and Price in vehicles they had crashed on state Route 303 on the way to practice at the Coliseum. Ehlo said Newman was in a red Corvette and Price a jeep. Fortunately, no one suffered serious injuries, Ehlo said, and he drove them to practice.

“That 303 was pretty dangerous if it got snowy and icy,” Ehlo said.

Sometimes when the Cavs practiced at the Coliseum, they would run into other celebrities. Ehlo remembers riding an elevator with the likes of professional wrestlers Hulk Hogan and Jimmy “Superfly” Snuka when the WWF was in town.

Cloth tunnels were set up in the Coliseum for a Michael Jackson concert, so fans wouldn't be able to see the “King of Pop” until he was on stage. Suddenly, certain parts of the arena were off limits to Cavs players.

“They were very, very stern with telling us where we could walk,” Ehlo said.

But perhaps the strangest Coliseum sight Ehlo recalls stemmed from deer hunting by Daugherty and former Cavs guard Dell Curry, the father of Akron-born Warriors superstar Stephen Curry.

“I walked in one day and Brad and Dell were in there cutting up a buck in the garage right outside of our locker room,” Ehlo said. “They had gone and got a buck earlier, before practice, and were cleaning it up.”

Brad Daugherty and the Cavs adored fans who packed the Richfield Coliseum

Neither wildlife nor opposing NBA teams looked forward to encountering five-time All-Star center Daugherty in Richfield.

“Everybody hated playing there,” Daugherty, 58, said. “... Everybody felt like it was out in the middle of nowhere. It was uncomfortable, and it was always cold.

“We had the home-court advantage, and once we got to where we were pretty good, we just used it. It just fueled us.”

Daugherty, Nance, Wilkens and Embry volunteered opinions about the Cavs having the best NBA fans in the late 1980s and early 1990s. They made the playoffs in five of Wilkens' seven seasons as coach.

Michael Jordan — and “The Shot” over Ehlo in 1989 — stood in the way of those Cavs reaching the NBA Finals. The farthest they advanced was the Eastern Conference Finals in 1992, when Jordan and the Chicago Bulls eliminated them in the sixth game of a best-of-seven series. In the previous round, the Cavs had knocked out the Boston Celtics, prevailing 122-104 in Game 7 of the conference semifinals at the Coliseum, which had 20,000-plus seats. It was Larry Bird's last game as an NBA player.

“Forty-five minutes before game time, you couldn't hear yourself thinking in the building,” said Embry, who lived in Moreland Hills during his career as Cavs general manager and president. “I never experienced anything like that.”

Most visiting teams stayed at the Richfield Holiday Inn. Cleveland hotels were options, too, but they required longer bus rides to and from the Coliseum.

“People didn't like where the Coliseum was,” Ehlo said. “If [a visiting team] got there for an afternoon game, there was, shoot, cows in the pasture. It wasn't a sore thumb, but it was just the only thing out there.”

Nance said he can drive by the land where the Coliseum stood nowadays and “hear people screaming, pulling for their team.”

Cavs fans filled the building even when there was snow “up to your waist,” Daugherty said, and he related well to them. He had an apartment and house in Fairlawn before moving to Hudson.

“I could go into my grocery store, and it was more about, 'Hey, Brad, how you doing? Man, loved the game last night,' or, 'Man, you guys didn't play great. What do you got to do?'” Daugherty said. “It was so conversational with people.

“Now everything's so big in the NBA and the NFL. These guys are kind of, and you understand, quarantined off and petitioned off, so when you see them, it's more like rock stars. We were just part of the community, so it didn't feel odd to stand and talk to people for 30 minutes about how you're trying to get better and what's going on with the team.”

Larry Nance Sr. and his wife, Jaynee, continue to live in Bath Township after his NBA career

When Nance and his wife, Jaynee, explained why they decided to stay in Summit County, their reasons were primarily centered on the people of Northeast Ohio. All three of their children graduated from Revere High School.

“It's just a perfect place to raise a family,” Nance said.

The couple's daughter, Casey, lives in West Akron. A New Orleans Pelicans big man and former Cavs player, Larry Jr. has a house in Bath, where his younger brother, Pete, is staying this season because he's a member of the NBA G League's Cleveland Charge.

The Cavs acquired Larry Nance Sr. in a trade with the Phoenix Suns in 1988. At the time, he and Jaynee thought they would continue to spend offseasons in Arizona, where they met. They tried it for about a month, but it didn't feel right. They wanted to be in Northeast Ohio year-round.

“They're the kind of family that you want in your community because it helps the community to be a better place,” Wilkens said.

Nance, 65, is a native of Anderson, South Carolina, who played college basketball at Clemson University and began his NBA career with the Suns. He conceded he wasn't thrilled about being introduced to wintry weather in Northeast Ohio when he first arrived from Phoenix. He had never driven in snow.

“I would've never admitted it if I couldn't drive in snow because my father was a truck driver, and I thought I was going to be a truck driver, so we think we're good drivers,” Nance said with a laugh.

The Nances lived in an apartment in Mayfield Heights and a condo in Broadview Heights before they bought their house in Bath. Teammates would often join Nance for fishing in his backyard pond. The Nances made many friends and found the area to be an ideal fit.

“We have horse privileges, but we're seven minutes from a mall,” Jaynee said.

A three-time All-Star power forward, Nance said the late Cavs center John “Hot Rod” Williams “became my best friend I've ever had.”

“Hot Rod” lived in Fairlawn and frequented Rudolph's Bar-B-Que in Montrose. Another popular restaurant among Cavs players was the Taverne of Richfield.

Nance said he cherishes the camaraderie he and his teammates shared. Embry noted Nance often expresses gratitude for bringing him to Cleveland.

“We just fell in love with each other where we were just always together,” Nance said. “We would come to practice, and we wouldn't leave practice till 4 o'clock, just sitting around talking.

“We kind of took it for granted, but now looking back and watching teams and watching situations, we know how lucky we were to have the coaching staff, the fans and everything we had.”

Cleveland Cavaliers legend Mark Price helped create “Field of Dreams” feeling at a local park

Churches and an outdoor basketball court were among the places where Cavs fans could see key figures of the organization on a regular basis.

Four-time All-Star point guard Price became heavily involved with The Chapel in Akron, and Ehlo attended the church as a result.

Wilkens lived in Fairlawn and went to St. Bernard Parish in Akron, where he befriended Sister Kathy McIntyre. As a U.S. men's Olympic basketball team assistant coach in 1992, Wilkens suffered a torn Achilles tendon in a pickup game. When Wilkens returned from Spain, McIntyre offered aid.

“I got to know a nun who was a huge Cavs fan,” Wilkens said. “She always would say hello at church and make sure to see did I need anything, did I need someone to bring Communion to where I lived?”

Price, 60, became close with Knute Larson, the former longtime pastor of The Chapel.

“The first time I actually went down to just say hello to the pastor, Knute, I said, 'I'm Mark Price. I'm new to the area,'” the 6-foot Price said. “And he goes, 'That's interesting because the only Mark Price I've heard of plays for the Cleveland Cavaliers.' And I said, 'Well, that's me,' because I don't look like an NBA player. It's like he never forgot that to this day.”

Price's presence undoubtedly surprised the playground hoops enthusiasts at Valley Vista Park in the summer of 1988.

It's when Ehlo said he and Price played pickup games at Valley Vista three or four times a week after being introduced to the park by former Cavs point guard John Bagley. At the time, they all lived at Timber Top, which sits partway down the West Portage Trail hill from Valley Vista.

“It was a blast,” Price said. “It was kind of a 'Field of Dreams' type thing. As soon as we started playing, all the sudden people from the neighborhoods would just start coming out and watching us play. I just laugh 'cause can you imagine guys doing that now, NBA guys just playing pickup ball with random guys off the streets?

“No one was trying to hurt us out there or anything. It was just a way for us to stay in shape and connect with the community. I don't know how many times I've run into guys over the years [who have said], 'Yeah, I played against you at Valley Vista.'”

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After Price signed a contract extension with the Cavs, he bought a house in Hudson. His oldest son's first name is Hudson.

“We actually named him after a missionary called Hudson Taylor but, living in Hudson, I quit trying to explain it away after a while because everybody had the jokes,” Price said.

More than anything, the support the Cavs received has stuck with Price.

“The Cleveland fans are so great,” he said. “We kind of embedded ourselves in the community. It's like we were one of them, and they were one with us.”

All these years later, nostalgia can still unite everyone who experienced the Richfield Coliseum and the bonds it forged in Summit County.

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Nate Ulrich can be reached at nulrich@thebeaconjournal.com. On Twitter: @ByNateUlrich.

This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Cavs icons nostalgic about Greater Akron, Richfield Coliseum