ARKANSAS SPORTS HALL OF FAME Michael Cage : Oh, those Blue Devils days
Posted on Sunday, January 27, 2008
URL: http://www.nwanews.com/adg/Sports/214950/
Second in a series of articles profiling individuals who will be inducted into the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame this year. The Hall of Fame banquet will be Feb. 22.
Michael Cage is a broadcaster these days,
but when the subject turns to the glory
days of West Memphis High School basketball, Cage can’t find the right words. “I don’t know that I can describe it,” said Cage, who was a senior star on the first of West Memphis’ back-to-back 30-0 overall state championship teams. “That was real, real special. I didn’t fully realize just how special it was until about 10 years later.”
Cage will be inducted into the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame with 11 others Feb. 22 at Alltel Arena in North Little Rock.
Cage’s high school coach, Bill Terwilliger, said he always knew Cage had the ability to be a great basketball player.
“I’ve always said that if they can do it in high school, they can do it in college. And, if they did it in college they could do it in the pros,” said Terwilliger, who moved into administration at West Memphis two years after Cage graduated and is now retired. “They certainly did it in high school. We were beating teams in the top level of high school basketball in Arkansas and Tennessee. We’d play anybody back then.”
“They were the taller team,” Terwilliger said. “There were more bangers on that squad.”
Cage’s Hall of Fame credentials certainly benefited from a notable college career at San Diego State and 15 years as one of the NBA’s most dominant rebounders.
But Cage’s days at West Memphis — where one of his teammates was Keith Lee, another future NBA player — stand out.
“I had known these guys since first grade,” Cage said. “To me, we were just all guys from the neighborhood. All the sudden people started talking to us about how special we were. We just wanted to win. We were all guys from a neighborhood who liked to play with each other.”
Cage’s NBA career included stops with the Los Angeles Clippers, Seattle SuperSonics, Cleveland Cavaliers, Philadelphia 76 ers and New Jersey Nets. There was an appearance in the Western Conference semifinals with the SuperSonics in 1990, and a 63-victory season with the Sonics in 1993-1994. But nothing like the time at West Memphis. “That was the most special team I ever played with,” Cage said.
KICKING IT Cage retired from the NBA after the 2001-2002 season, allowing him to spend more time with his family: wife Jodie and children Alexis, 12; Michael Jr., 10; and Sydney, 9. Cage transformed from soccer dad to soccer referee after spending many hours watching his children play.
“I had to learn how the game was played and the tactics,” Cage said. “I learned so much about it and I got to love the sport so much that I got into officiating.”
Watching and officiating soccer did not satisfy all of Cage’s competitive urges.
“When you retire from the NBA, you get unplugged,” Cage said. “You feel discombobulated and disconnected. When the crowds are gone, it’s tough. You’re away from something that you are used to. That’s why I’m glad that I’m back in broadcasting, because I feel reconnected. And these people will talk to me because I was always a standup guy and because they know me.”
Cage spent two seasons working as a color commentator for Memphis Grizzlies TV broadcasts, a situation that allowed him to try his hand at broadcasting and reconnect with his hometown.
“I got to catch up with a lot of friends and family that I hadn’t seen in years,” said Cage, who will spend a few days in Arkansas when he returns for the Hall of Fame induction banquet. “I’m looking forward to spending some time in West Memphis and spending a couple
CALIFORNIA DREAM Cage had his pick of colleges coming out of West Memphis in 1980, but when he got to San Diego State for a visit, he was smitten. It’s a love affair that continues today, as Cage and his family live in Newport Coast, Calif., about 45 minutes north of San Diego. Cage does pregame and postgame shows for the Los Angeles Lakers and Clippers for Fox Sports West. He also does analyst work for West Coast Conference games. “ When I came out to San Diego State, coming from West Memphis — a town of about 30, 000 people — to San Diego, Calif. — a city of over 1 million people, I was blown away,” Cage said. “The lifestyle, the environment, it all drew me in. People out here go to the beach and go surfing. I’ve always seen myself as someone who likes to be stimulated and challenged.” Cage led the San Diego State Aztecs to a 68-44 record while averaging nearly 17 points and 12 rebounds per game from 1980-1984. As a senior, he averaged 24. 5 points and 11. 9 rebounds per game. Terwilliger said that as good as Cage was during his high school days, it was his development at San Diego State that pushed him to the NBA. “I think he became better as he went to college and got a better background,” Terwilliger said. “It’s what he learned in college and in those first few years in the pros that helped him the most. “ We got to see a few of the games late at night. The rest of it, we had to see that in the newspaper, but we followed what he did.”
NBA DAYS The San Diego Clippers used the 14 th pick of the 1984 NBA Draft to select Cage, but Cage’s first few professional seasons were trying ones, playing for a losing team that had moved to Los Angeles and played in the shadows of the flashy Los Angeles Lakers teams of the 1980 s. “I spent the first four years of my career trying to master my game,” Cage said of his time in Los Angeles. “I was not happy until I cut my niche in this business. Even though I won the rebounding championship in my fourth year with the Clippers, I wasn’t happy because I wanted to win at that level.”
Cage was the league’s top rebounder in 1988, but it did not come easily.
Cage battled back and forth with the Chicago Bulls’ Charles Oakley throughout the 1987-1988 season, with both players averaging around 13 rebounds a game. Cage said he knew that he was close to Oakley going into the final game of the season against the Seattle Sonics. But when he walked into the locker room, he found a note telling him all the particulars.
“There was a sign in my locker that said that I needed 28 to win,” Cage said. “It said that I would be only the fourth forward in the NBA to win the title.”
Cage pulled down a careerhigh 30 rebounds and to this day is one of only five forwards in NBA history to win the rebounding title.
“It was so difficult to be a forward and win a rebounding title in those days,” Cage said. “You’ve got to remember that back then, everybody on the team rebounded well. It’s not like today where you’ve got a handful of guys averaging more than 10 rebounds a game. Everybody was rebounding the ball.”
There were 11 players who averaged 10 or more rebounds per game in the 1987-1988 season, compared with seven who averaged 10 or more in the 2006-2007 season.
Joe Kleine, who played center in the NBA for 15 seasons, said Cage’s biggest asset was his strength.
“When he bumped you or put a forearm on you, you were going to go where he wanted you to go,” said Kleine, who is in his first season as an assistant coach for UALR. “To win any kind of title in the NBA, it’s a heck of an accomplishment.”
Cage’s rebounding exploits in Los Angeles didn’t amount to much when the Clippers drafted Danny Manning with the first overall pick in 1988. Cage was traded to Seattle for the rights to Gary Grant and a first-round pick in 1989. Cage said he didn’t feel slighted by the trade, especially after finding success in Seattle. The Sonics went 47-35 during Cage’s first season in Seattle and won their openinground playoff series over the Houston Rockets 3-1 before falling to the Los Angeles Lakers 4-0 in the conference semifinals. “I really liked the ’ 90 s and all it brought,” said Cage, who spent six seasons in Seattle, including 1993-1994 when the Sonics went 63-19. “The winning really reminded me of the high school days,” Cage said. “It was a wonderful time to be a part of the NBA family.”
GOOD OL’ DAYS More than state titles and winning streaks, Cage said he thinks back to friendships formed during those highflying days in West Memphis. One of those was with guard Tim Harrell, now a preacher in Oklahoma.
“Tim Harrell and myself, we used to pray in the showers together before the game in junior high,” Cage said. “Because the coach didn’t want to deal with that before the game, we’d go — fully dressed — into the locker room to pray. I didn’t realize how special that was.”
Harrell went on to an All-America career at NAIA Central Bible College in Springfield, Mo., Cage went to San Diego State and 6-10 teammate Keith Lee went to Memphis, where he starred for the Tigers before going on to the NBA.
The three formed the core of a team that outscored opponents by an average of almost 20 points per game during a 30-0 run in the 1979-1980 season.
It might seem surprising now, but the spotlight wasn’t always on Cage. The taller Lee often outscored the 6-9 Cage, but Terwilliger said that wasn’t what stood out most.
“When he was a senior, Keith’s junior year, Keith might have gotten more points or numbers, but at crucial times Michael was the one that would step up and get the key rebound,” Terwilliger said. “Lots of times it doesn’t show up on the stats, but he was the one that drove us to a lot of those wins.”
The Blue Devils lost to Conway in the opening round of the Class AAAA playoffs in 1979. That was the last high school game that Cage would lose.
“It was just really like a dream come true,” Cage said. “We had so much success. I really didn’t know how special it was until it was long after. I didn’t really understand how special that team was.”