Craig Ehlo: with three seconds left in an elimination game, his layup put the Cleveland Cavaliers up by one. But that basket only set the stage for "The Shot" - The Game I'll Never Forget

AS A 14-YEAR VETERAN OF THE NBA, Craig Ehlo says he has a lot to offer his high school team. But as a coach of Rogers High School in Spokane, Wash., Ehlo is off to a 1-39 start over his first two seasons.

"I'm struggling as a coach," Ehlo says. "I'm 1-39. We went 0-20 my first year, but we won one game last year. There's really no pressure to win at the school I'm at. We're an inner-city school with some low-income areas. I don't have a lot of horses, so it's teaching me patience again. I played for coach [Lenny] Wilkens so long that I'm just happy doing the things he instilled, getting involved in people's lives. So I'm trying to teach life skills along with basketball skills."

The former guard for the Houston Rockets, Cleveland Cavaliers, Atlanta Hawks, and Seattle SuperSonics says his first and only win was "Awesome. It was the third game of the year and I thought we had finally broke that mold of falling into a losing skid. The worst thing to happen to us is that we had a bye the next day. We played Tuesday and won, had a bye Friday, and didn't play until the next Tuesday, so the enthusiasm and confidence we needed didn't carry over. But we were competitive, The first year we were never in games. We lost most of them by 20 points. This past year, we'd lose by five, six, stuff like that."

But if there's anyone who knows about overcoming adversity, it's Ehlo. He started at Odessa College in Texas, transferred to Washington State, but wasn't drafted until the third round of the 1983 NBA draft by Houston. Ehlo played 63 minutes in his rookie year. That's minutes, not games.

The Rockets waived him on Oct 30, 1986. The only work he could find was with the Mississippi Jets of the CBA. Ehlo's basketball future looked bleak. He could have easily traded in his high tops for a briefcase and a job behind some desk.

But the Cavaliers rescued him off the scrap heap a few months later, on Jan. 13, 1987. Against all odds, Ehlo became a vital cog in one of the best teams of the late 1980s and early 1990s. "I had a lot of people who supported me: My wife, her parents, my parents," Ehlo says. "And then what made it so good was the fans in Cleveland. They kind of believe in the underdog. Having that going for me helped a lot.

"I thought I was going to be the average guy, three and a half years of playing. I pictured myself like that. But I found the right place, the right fit. It's the old cliche lust being in the right place. I live in Spokane and I see Richie Frahm, who played with the Gonzaga Bulldogs (graduating after the 1999-2000 season). The same thing is happening to him. I just stress patience to him, to wait and see where he can fit in, because right now he's not with anybody. He kind of reminds me of myself."

Ehlo became the Cavs' "Mr. Everything." Long-range shooting? Ehlo made 621 treys during his career and took a few trips to the NBA's three-point shooting contest. Defense? He was ferocious, often assigned to guard the Michael Jordans or Clyde Drexlers of the NBA. And he was comfortable starting or coming off the bench.