Kings' farewell to original Arco brings back memories

It ended 20 years ago tonight like so many of the 123 games that came before, with enough noise to strain the joints of the building and a loss. Of course with a loss.

The Kings played in their original Sacramento home for the last time April 23, 1988. They fell to the Portland Trail Blazers 124-110 despite 35 points and 17 rebounds from Otis Thorpe in a season finale accentuated by players wading into the stands to shake hands with customers from the latest announced capacity crowd of 10,333. Reports from the night did not specify whether it was done in appreciation of the support or in commiseration.

Both fans and team said farewell to Arco Arena I after three seasons on North Market Boulevard near the Truxel Road intersection. It was an intimate gathering place and a transition point between the arrival from Kansas City and completion of the actual, permanent Arco about a mile to the west in the empty fields of Natomas.

The final night was so fitting. The Kings were short-handed, lacking cohesion and this time also short on bodies as only eight players dressed, including a 30-year-old guard who led the team in scoring that 1987-88 season, Reggie Theus. They fell behind by 20 points in the opening quarter and got booed.

"It's been the longest, toughest, worst year of my life," the coach, Jerry Reynolds, said afterward.

The 24-58 finish was part of a 90-156 record in the three seasons, although with a 64-60 mark in what The Bee called Kings arena in refusing to concede free advertising to the corporate namesake. Bill Russell lasted 58 games as coach before being kicked upstairs and replaced by Reynolds. Willis Reed left as an assistant in February to become the coach of the New Jersey Nets.

The building was a carnival house, though. Ten thousand, three hundred and thirty-three fans crammed in every night, mostly coming through the circular glass entrances at the corners with copper-colored sculptures, and forged the NBA's newest market as a center of passionate support.

"I remember getting to the arena and seeing the people out in the lot, like tailgating," said Larry Drew, a Kings guard the first season and now an Atlanta Hawks assistant coach. "I remember this one group, everyone was in tuxedos. It was like one big party. The people were just so excited about having NBA basketball there. It seemed like everything we did, they cheered. Whether we made a mistake or scored a basket, they cheered everything we did. The atmosphere was unbelievable."

Try maybe even better than the madness of the current home.

"I think the fans are on you in Arco, but I don't think anywhere near like it was in the old building," Theus said. "I remember it being more on top of you."

The former home is still there, sort of. After the Kings cleared out, a business came in, then another. Then, in December 2005, the state Department of Consumer Affairs turned it into a three-story building with 200,000 square feet of office space at 1625 North Market Blvd.

Some of the throwback touches remain: the old markers on the light posts in the parking lot (F-3, D-6, etc.); the circular glass entrances still in use and the sculptures that remain; the pronounced reminder of the past with Sports Drive still bordering the eastern side of the facility; and the plaque on the outside wall at one of the corners that notes "SACRAMENTO'S FIRST ARENA".

But mostly, it's hard to believe they played professional basketball there.

"Sometimes," Reynolds says now, "there's a question whether we did or not."

It's now home to about 850 state employees more than the birthplace of the NBA here. Even the Kings Room on the ground floor in the north wing is nothing more than coincidence. Many of the meeting spaces just happen to be named after California counties.

The one-time gravel lot for overflow parking is now paved and home to rows of industrial buildings. The location of the former center court is covered by about 20 feet of dirt and concrete that raised the floor. It's also technically outside, in what has become an open-air courtyard between the two wings of the complex.

Reynolds, now the Kings' director of player personnel and television analyst, said he still drives by every six months or so, just for nostalgia, but a visit two weeks ago was the first time he walked the grounds in the 20 years. He saw the office he once shared in close quarters with Russell and Reed. It now belongs solely to Scott Reid, the chief deputy of the Consumer Affairs director.

The workers there, director Carrie Lopez said, talk about the history of the facility "all the time. They always refer to the legacy."

"Well," Reynolds told her, "I hope you get more accomplished than we did."

It was that kind of life there.

"There really has never been a building in the league with that kind of atmosphere, I don't believe," Reynolds said. "Certainly not in the last 40 years. The 10,333 packed, it reminded me so much of the great atmosphere of Indiana high school basketball and some of the arenas they have back there. Larry Bird had told me the same thing, that it reminded him of a lot of that. It's just special, and that's certainly what they had at Arco.

"That little building with 10,333 was really unique. The crowd really was in the action. And the locker rooms were the size of my current office, practically. For visiting teams, it was terrible. They would dress at the hotels. They wouldn't even bother to dress at the arena. It was just hopeless."

But temporary. The Kings and their opponents made it through the three cramped seasons and moved on together, to the new Arco Arena a mile away and another new beginning, after the first one ended 20 years ago tonight.

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