By Warren Kagarise

Staff writer

WABASSO - Once, his business was basketball. Ernie Graham broke records at the University of Maryland and set off on a promising NBA career - until drug addiction sidelined his career and nearly killed him.

During a stop at the Dasie Hope Center after-school program last week, Mr. Graham told 60 students about his fall from basketball great to street junkie.

"Everybody has an opportunity to say no," Mr. Graham, 48, said during the March 26 event.

But Mr. Graham, a bright student during his school days in Baltimore, fell into drug use when he was 13 years old. Though his grades dropped from drug use, his basketball skills never slipped, and he worried little about the consequences, Mr. Graham told his audience.

"I was in a downward spiral and I had no idea where I was going," he said.

Colleges across the nation wooed him, but Mr. Graham stayed close to home at the University of Maryland. In 1978, he set a single game scoring record there with 44 points in 25 minutes of play.

After college, Mr. Graham was drafted by the Philadelphia 76ers. But he failed a mandatory drug test, and he lost his 76ers contract.

"The day they tear that contract up, you get nothing," Mr. Graham said.

With his chances for a career in the NBA dashed, Mr. Graham played professional basketball in Europe and South America, where rules were less stringent. He admitted to using cocaine and heroin during those years.

"Drug dealers had my money all over the world," he said.

Eventually, his basketball career ended, and Mr. Graham turned to crime to pay for his drug habit. He was thrown in jail five times.

For 22 years, he told his audience he fought addictions to alcohol, cigarettes, cocaine and heroin. Drugs, he said, took away his will to live.

"I was so ashamed of myself I didn't want to live anymore," Mr. Graham said.

After completing drug rehabilitation, a sympathetic judge gave Mr. Graham another chance. Since 1996, he has worked in outreach programs, encouraging children and teenagers to avoid his mistakes.

At the Dasie Hope Center, he asked students if they had ever seen an alcoholic or an addict.

"I don't think you'll ever find anyone that wanted that for a career," Mr. Graham said.

Frank Kelly, a former Maryland state senator and part-time Orchid Island resident, helped organize Mr. Graham's visit to the Dasie Hope Center. Mr. Kelly works with Mr. Graham on his outreach program.

"He had it all and drugs cost him the opportunity to reach his career as a basketball player," Mr. Kelly said.

Verna Wright, executive director of the Dasie Hope Center, said Mr. Graham's message resonated, especially with the older children in the audience.

"There is no time to sugarcoat things," Mrs. Wright said. "This is reality."