Ehlo settles in as coach at EWU

Kelli Pedroia once asked, "How great is it to do something that you love every day?"  in reference to her husband Dustin, the star Boston Red Sox second baseman. It's a startling premise -— how often do we take time to reflect on what makes us genuinely happy? Pedroia "got it." His wife's query was testament enough.

How great is it to do something that you love every day. Craig Ehlo, the Texas native and 14-year NBA veteran, perhaps best known to Gonzaga students as the color commentator for KHQ broadcasts of men's basketball games, exudes the same sort of exuberance when speaking about his new occupation.

This past spring, Ehlo left his post at KHQ, where he'd worked telecasts alongside play-by-play man Greg Heister, to join newly appointed Eastern Washington men's basketball coach Jim Hayford's staff as an assistant coach. "One of the first things I did after getting the job was to go out and get Craig," Hayford said. "He said without hesitation that he would do it. That was huge for us."

Ehlo is effusive in his praise for his former colleagues at KHQ, and says he thoroughly enjoyed his time working with Heister.

But the allure of coaching — to go from impartial observer to someone actively invested in wins and losses — proved too enticing an opportunity to pass up. It's the closest thing to playing, after all — something Ehlo hasn't been able to do since retiring back in 1997.

"I want to breathe that fire again," The Killers front man Brandon Flowers croons in "Read My Mind." How do you rediscover that inimitable rush of adrenaline that punched through your mind before tip-off, when you used to stare across the court at Michael Jordan before the 48-minute furor of an NBA playoff game? Nearly 15 years on, does it ever come back? Can it?

Ehlo says he feels it through coaching. He tells tales of his playing career to his new players at Eastern, who actively seek him out for snippets of information about the league. In them he sees attentiveness and desire — a craving to better themselves. He can relate to that.

He teaches them the little tricks that once helped him maintain a career at the highest level for more than a decade, accumulating 7,492 points (8.6 ppg), 3,139 rebounds (3.6 per game) and 2,456 assists (2.8 per game) once all was said and done.

Ehlo wants this year's Eastern senior class — which has never enjoyed a winning season during their time in Cheney — to go out with a bang, bolstered by a feeling that they imparted a bit of legacy during their four years on campus.

After all, he knows first-hand how a basketball team can impact a town. People still approach him in Pullman to congratulate him on his 1982-83 season with Washington State, when Ehlo led the eighth-seeded Cougars to the second round of the NCAA tournament, where they would lose to a Ralph Sampson-led Virginia side 54-49.

Whether it was facing Sampson's top-seeded Cavaliers, or guarding the opposing team's best player — something he was frequently tasked with as a professional — Ehlo loves a challenge.

Take his three-year turn as coach of the Rogers High varsity basketball team, right here in Spokane. Only one year removed from hanging up his jersey for the last time, Ehlo hadn't expected or actively sought a coaching position upon returning to the Spokane area, where he lives with his wife (the two met at Washington State) and three children. But when the Rogers principal approached him with the opportunity after the former coach had quit just months before the start of the season, Ehlo took to it like a fish to water. Sometimes the naturals just know, as John Updike once wrote in "Rabbit, Run."

By the end of his third season at the helm (1998-2001), a team that had lumbered to an inglorious 0-20 finish in his first year had battled to a 12-8 mark. Ehlo takes great pride in reciting that achievement. The sophomores he had inherited in '98 had transformed into senior leaders. They'd managed to leave a legacy they could always look back on with pride.

They say the best coaches are like teachers — actively seeking to draw forth their players' potential. It's a fitting take on Socrates' basic tenet of instruction, and you feel that the Greek philosopher might have liked that aspect of basketball. There is an absence of ego in Ehlo — and that is perfect for teaching the game.