Al Cervi left East High School in Buffalo after his junior year to start playing professional basketball. He played for teams in Buffalo and Rochester before World War II interrupted his career for four years. Upon his return from service, he spent three seasons with the Rochester Royals who won the 1945-46 National Basketball League championship. Throughout the late 1940s, Cervi reigned as one of the NBL’s premier guards. He was consistently among the league leaders in scoring and also was a tenacious defensive player. In 1948, Cervi moved to the rival Syracuse Nationals team where he successfully assumed the role as player-coach for the next five seasons. He finished his career in Syracuse with three more seasons as a bench coach and an outstanding overall record of 266-127.  The highlights of his coaching career were the 1949-50 season when the Nats posted a league best 51-13 record and the 1954-55 season when his squad won the National Basketball Association  title over Fort Wayne after a tough seven-game series. Cervi was elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1985.

Ted Cerosky was a product of  Flushing High School in Queens, New York. In an era of very rough play with games played in cages and no subsitutions, Ceresoky stood out for his toughness and stamina. After his Flushing High School days, Cerosky played basketball, football and basketball with the White stone Warlows, a Queens Athlectic club. Cerosky enjoyed the  most successful years of his career with the famed Long Island-Pro-Imps who were virtually unbeatable at home in tiny, cramped Moose Hall in Astoria, Long Island.

Joe Cavanaugh, along with his brothers Archie and Willie, were mainstays of their hometown Manayunk Yunkers in the Philadelphia Basketball League. In 1909, the franchise transferred to North Philadelphia. A dozen games into the season, Cavanaugh was at the center of a series of events responsible for the collapse of the league. After being disqualified from a game by referee Whitey Schoenhut, Cavanaugh struck the official in the jaw, knocking him out. League President William Scheffer quickly announced that Cavanaugh was banned from the league. When some of the teams in the league failed to back Schaffer in his action against Cavanaugh, he resigned and the league collapsed.  Cavanaugh had a well deserved reputation as a fiery brawling battler who succeeded by intimidating opponents and referees alike. He was a good athlete who excelled at the center jump and played ferocious defense. Cavanaugh was the center on two successive Eastern Basketball League championship teams: Reading in 1912 and Jasper in 1913. While still active in professional basketball, Cavanaugh began a thirty year career with the Philadelphia Police Department.