It will come to him the next time he’s in Dorothy Lane Market and has one of his meetings with 75-year-old Mark Haufe, who is a UD hoops fan like none other.
This week the Flyer Faithful are converging on Washington D.C. for the A-10 Tournament and UD’s quarterfinal opener Friday night at Capital One Arena, but Haufe will be back in Dayton, watching the game on television.
Some UD fans might rival his love and passion for the Flyers, but no one can match his total commitment to Dayton basketball.
His body is covered with tattoos. He said there are around 100 and much of it is eye-catching, top-quality work.
He’s like the Dayton Art Institute on two painted legs.
While he has quite an eclectic collection – from stunning portraits of Saint Maximillian Kolbe, the Polish Catholic priest known as “The Saint of Auschwitz” and Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, who’s called “The Lily of the Mohawks,” to more familiar faces of Paul Laurence Dunbar – the “plethora, the cornucopia,” of his images, as he refers to them, are Dayton Flyers.
There is Donald Smith, Roosevelt Chapman, Obi Toppin, DaRon Holmes II and Roger Brown.
On April 10th, Grant gets added to the gallery in about the only spot Haufe has left on his body, a patch of inkless skin on the lower right side of his back.
He plans to add Don May there, too, but first comes Grant, whom he respects as both a coach and a man, which is why he often looks for him when they both stop by DLM.
Just before I left to cover the games in D.C., I visited Haufe at his Kettering apartment.
There was no missing his maroon Kia Optima in the parking lot. The rear driver’s side windows display photos of Donald Smith and Roger Brown.
The rear panel on the other side of the car has two “In Memory Of” photos. One is of Chris Daniels doing a reverse dunk; the other has Steve McElvene smiling into the camera. Both big men died of undetected heart ailments while playing for the Flyers.
Haufe met me at the back door of his building and then made the arduous trek up three flights of stairs, using a cane to steady him and his grit to lift him.
He’s dealing with cancer and more than chemo or radiation, some of his best tonic comes from his tats, and the conversations they create.
“Welcome to my apartment,” he said, stopping at his door. “Right now, it’s more like an Obi Toppin Museum.”
Inside you found photos of him and Obi, who five years ago was the high-flying star of the 29-2 Flyers and now has taken his above-the-rim antics to the Indiana Pacers.
One photo shows the two of them standing side by side on the UD Arena concourse.
Another shows him flanked by Obi; Obi’s dad, Obadiah; his brother Jacob; and his pal and former UD teammate, Jalen Crutcher.
In that photo Haufe is holding a pair of autographed basketball shoes, a gift from Obi.
The best Obi memento though is on his upper right arm, a colorful, could-come-to-life-at-any-second rendering of Toppin done by local tattoo talent Evan Chandler.
After he completed it a few years ago, Chandler displayed the work online and Toppin happened to see it and responded:
“That’s love!”
There’s another compilation on one side of Haufe’s back that has Obi pictured along with his dad, Holmes and Chapman.
The open space next to all that has been saved for May and Grant.
Haufe already has a special reference to Grant on his body. His right knee and part of his leg are covered by rays of sunshine coming through a basketball net and the words: Jay’s Light.
It’s a salute to the mental health and suicide prevention initiative Grant and his wife Chris started after their young daughter’s untimely death three years ago.
One of the times he met Grant at DLM, Haufe showed him that tribute.
“He told me, ‘God bless you,’” Haufe saud quietly.
“I’ve been a Flyers fan a long time. I saw Blackburn and Donoher, O’Brien and Purnell, Brian Gregory and Archie Miller.
“And I’ll tell you what, just from a human being standpoint, he is the most humble and nicest man I know. He has that composure on the sidelines, too.
“I’ve seen coaches scream at their players, but not him. I like how he treats them. I like how he handles himself. It tells you a lot about him.
“And that’s why I’ll be honored to have him put on my back.”
“The Man, the Myth and the Legend”
Haufe grew up in Oakwood and Kettering; was schooled at St. Albert and was part of the second graduating class at Alter High School.
After that there was a stint at the University of Dayton and Sinclair, where he briefly was part of the Sinclair Satans, as the basketball team was known back then.
He eventually graduated from Wright State with a degree in sociology,
Along the way he and his older brother John, who died three years ago, became dedicated UD basketball fans.
“Our dad had seats in a real low section of the Fieldhouse, and I first remember games there about 1955 and 1956. I remember the Bockhorn Brothers.
“I saw Dave DeBuscherre score 44 points there. I remember Eddie Miles, “The Man with the Golden Arm” from Seattle University. And I remember Wes Unseld walking by and I looked up and thought, ‘Wow!’”
He was mesmerized by Roger Brown who, arguably, was the greatest player ever to wear a UD basketball jersey before he was unfairly dismissed from the university for his association as a high school kid with a gambling figure who approached him and others on a New York playground.
Brown was never accused of wrongdoing, but the Flyers – and the NCAA – cut ties with him because of a bigger gambling scandal rocking college basketball.
“I saw him play with the freshman team in the Fieldhouse,” Haufe said. “And then, when he got blackballed, I remember going to the Fairgrounds Coliseum and sitting right under the basket, eating popcorn, as he played for Jones Brothers Morticians.”
It wasn’t until he was 69 years old that Haufe thought of getting a tattoo – and then it was just a simple UD logo he wanted for his arm.
He found Chandler, who then worked at the Aisle 9 tattoo shop in Centerville, and it took him half an hour to explain the logo and convince himself.
Soon he was coming to Chandler every few weeks with another tattoo idea, each one a little more elaborate than the last.
Chandler did much of the ink work on him until last Labor Day, when he was in a serious biking accident from which he is still recovering.
Since then Haufe has worked with other artists including Erin Tyler, who’s now in Englewood, and Gavin Schaeffer from Centerville. Both do wonderful work.
In turn they are just as amazed by him, he said with a grin: “Yeah, some people call me “The Man, the Myth and the Legend.”
“I wish I had more room”
Haufe likes the current Flyers’ team:
“With all those new players they had this year it just took a while for that chemistry to really mesh.
“Thank God Malachi Smith isn’t walking around in a boot again. And that French Guy! Man, I like that dude.
“Earlier this year when some of those naysayers went online and were saying stuff like ‘We need a new coach’ – I’m like, ‘You gotta be kidding! You don’t know a thing about basketball.
“You look at Coach Grant’s complete career – it’s absolutely amazing.”
That’s why he’s adding Grant to that rare vacant real estate on his back.
As he thought about it, he shook his head: “I wish I had more room. I’d like to have Johnny Davis on there. And there’s the Paxsons, and Monk Meineke, and Bill Uhl, and Bill Chmielewski.
“Yeah, Chmielewski wearing that NIT trophy on his head like a helmet, now that would make a cool tattoo. I might have to find room for that.”
He started to laugh when he thought back to just six years ago and all the debate it took to convince himself he’d be OK with a small UD logo on his arm.
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