Sun Kings: Yakima's Improbable Success Story

YAKIMA - This city was everything the owners of a Continental Basketball Association team could want. And less.

``It seemed like destiny,'' said Brooks Ellison. ``One day I was in California and the next day I was in Yakima, looking at the best arena in the league, with a chance to sign a coach who was a local legend and among people who really wanted us to be here, including the sports editor of the local newspaper.''

And then there was the sheer nothingness of it all. A major mountain range separating the city from Seattle and its diversions. No major-college or professional competition, just a movie here and a few beers at the tavern there.

``An isolated town with a top-notch arena,'' said Ellison. ``That's not a combination you find very often.''

So the 16-team CBA granted permission to move the ailing Topeka Sizzlers to a town in Washington state you had to wonder if anybody in the league had ever heard of, let alone visited.

Yakima, with 50,000 people, would be the second smallest of CBA cities, the only one in the Northwest and two thousand miles away from every other team in its division, teams from Omaha, Neb., and Sioux Falls and Rapid City, S.D.

Cazzie Russell stood on the sidelines, even in a dark suit still the most impressive figure on the court, directing traffic as coach of the Grand Rapids Hoops against the Yakima Sun Kings in a game played last week at the new $13 million Yakima SunDome.

You had to wonder if anyone in the building knew who he was, that this was one of the greatest college basketball players in history.

In this concrete, miniature Kingdome - the gray, paneled roof replicating its bigger cousin in Seattle - attention is as capricious as the game itself, back and forth, back and forth. The star of the evening might be the ``Dome Burger'' - three patties for three bucks. The atmosphere struck me as closer to the boat show than that of a basketball game, teenagers milling around, people socializing, even walking out early despite a one-point game in which the Sun Kings held on for a victory.

``We've found, to our surprise,'' said Ellison, a Sacramento attorney who is the team's president and general manager, ``that people in Yakima needed a place to gather in the wintertime. Bars are too small, movies too private. I know women who didn't want their husbands to buy season tickets now say they wouldn't miss a game, for the social benefits.''

Whatever the reasons - the 6,000-seat SunDome, the credibility given the franchise by its hiring of former Central Washington Coach Dean Nicholson, the novelty of professional sports or the paucity of activity in the Yakima Valley - the Sun Kings are working.

They rank fifth in a 16-team league in attendance (3,727) after selling the second-most season tickets (1,989). And they do it with a team with the league's worst record.

The Sun Kings (14-30) aren't going to make the playoffs.

``I think we're in our honeymoon period,'' said the 64-year-old Nicholson, who realizes he might be in his, as well. ``We lose a game and people come and say how much they enjoyed it and our effort.''

Actually, the Sun Kings have won nine of their past 12 games at home. One loss last week was a two-pointer to division-leading Omaha.

``I think we've got a good team; we've been in most games,'' said Nicholson, who resigned from Central after 26 years in the wake of allegations he illegally gave money to players.

``The coach,''said guard Corey Gaines, a former Sonic draft choice, ``is in his first year here, and he's learning just like us.''

Nicholson admits the experience has been rugged, traveling so much, losing so much, learning a new game with players who really would rather be somewhere else. A recent return home from Wichita Falls, Tex., took 13 hours.

``Truthfully,'' said Gaines, who has played with three NBA and three CBA teams - New Jersey, Philadelphia and Denver in the show, and Albany, Omaha and Yakima in the low - ``none of us want to be here. Yakima is a nice town, with nice people, but we all want to be in the NBA.''

Nicholson knows that.

``In college, if a player doesn't get his minutes his ego is hurt. Here, his career might be hurt. It tends to be more a players' league, while college is more a coaches' league.''

The Sun Kings got what was left of the Topeka franchise, which won only 10 of 56 games last year, worst in the league. That amounted to all-CBA center Jim Rowinski, a 6-foot-8 former Purdue star who has put in time with the NBA Miami Heat. The team's guards are Gaines, who played at UCLA and Loyola Marymount, and Luther Burks, who played college ball at Oklahoma City.

Burks is the leading scorer with a 21.8 average. There are seven players in double figures on this team that averages 117 points a game, but gives up five a game more.

Each team is limited to 10 players - no one fouls out - and a salary cap of $100,000, meaning each player averages $10,000, somewhat less than those playing in the NBA, which recognizes the CBA as its official developmental league.

Ellison, the team's general manager, fights the ``bush-league'' image.

``The players don't get a lot, but they get enough,'' he said. ``They make $600 a week for 18 weeks, they get free housing and they get a chance to fulfill their dreams. And the reality is, there is nowhere else for them to go.''

Ellison goes around town in a suit, telling people that the Sun Kings travel by air, not bus, that ``we fly United and American air lines. We do more drug testing than the NBA. This is professional basketball.''

There have been problems, however. One Sun King, Jerry Stroman, failed his drug test and the team dedicated itself to winning a game for him, which irritated a portion of the community that saw Stroman not as a victim, but a violator.

Forward Riley Smith, who played at Idaho, was quoted in a Spokane paper saying he didn't much like Yakima or Nicholson. Later, he denied making the statements.

There were no boos for Smith when he was introduced Monday. Little the Sun Kings do seems bad enough to bother their new fans.

Nearly a third of the players in the CBA have played in the NBA. Annually, 25 or so get called up. The Sun Kings have sent Mike Higgins to Sacramento.

``At the guard and small forward positions,'' said Nicholson, ``they're a heartbeat away. The talent in this league amazes me. I've enjoyed coaching them very much.''

Jim Scoggins, sports editor of the Yakima Herald-Republic, is even more impressed with the quality of talent and play in the league.

``You could bring Nevada-Las Vegas in here and the Sun Kings would kick their butts,'' he said.

I don't think so, but there is talent. Up front, the 6-7, 240-pound Smith can rebound. Rookie Lee Campbell from Southwest Missouri State is a an energetic small forward with NBA potential and recently-acquired Dennis Williams, a guard from Georgia, has great speed and quickness.

While Ellison admits the team must improve in the years to come, he compares Yakima with Sacramento, where the NBA Kings sell out no matter what.

The major question is whether Nicholson will return. Everyone admits he was a major part of selling the team in the first place.

``All I know,'' said Nicholson, ``is there a terrific group from Ellensburg sitting behind the bench at every game.''

Scoggins thinks Nicholson's hiring was the single most significant ingredient in the success of the franchise.

Both Ellison and Nicholson evade questions about Nicholson's future.

``I've learned a lot about the league, the clock, the talent pool, and I'd like to put it to use next year,'' said Nicholson, ``but I know they're not happy with the record. But neither am I.''

``We'll sit down after the season,'' said Ellison, ``and see what's best for everyone.''

The CBA probably doesn't care, as long as the franchise stays in Yakima.

``We think Yakima has been an exceptional addition to the league,'' said Terdema Ussery, the CBA's assistant commissioner. ``They made an impressive presentation to gain approval to move the franchise there, and have more than lived up to it since.''

Bob Wilson, a Sacramento attorney, bought the team in Topeka for $500,000 and looked at Fresno, Redding, Bakersfield and Stockton in California before discovering the lovely isolation of Yakima.

The arena, built by the county and the city, sits behind the horse-racing grandstand at the fairgrounds. It's a rough, tough section of town and there is hope the new arena might revitalize it.

``I think we're here to stay,'' said Ellison. ``The CBA and Yakima just go together.''

And for nothing else, because there is nothing else.

Blaine Newnham's column usually is published Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday in the Sports section of The Times.