Harlem, Shuffled
If Memory Swerves™, on this day in sporting history (June 6, 1981) a wiz-bang assemblage of globe-trotting round-ballers from the New York borough of Harlem emergency-landed on an island in the Pacific. To their great surprise, the land mass upon which they found themselves was none other than “Gilligan’s Island®,” celebrated home of the 1960’s Castaways from the S.S. Minnow! Indeed, the shipwrecked gang was all there: Skipper Jonas Grumby, floppy-hatted first mate Gilligan, the dim-witted Professor, billionaire Jim Backus, his ginger-haired actress wife Lovey Dovey and denim-shorted cutie pie Dawn Wells, harmony vocalist of variety show act Tony Orlando and Dawn. As those familiar with the islander’s goings-on will remember, the crew had launched a Club Med-like facility — sans running water, electricity and guests — called the “Castaways Resort,” but the witless Master Gilligan had unwisely signed the property over to the devious real estate baron Martin Landau, who had designs on chopping up the property for its valuable, science fictional, iron ore discovered on site. Fortunately, the Castaways uncovered the conspiracy and, in turn, duped Mr. Landau into putting the land contract on the line in a friendly roundball wager, one that pitted their new friends, the “Harlem Globetrotters,” against Landau’s team, “The New Invincibles,” a collection of bloody robots. True to their name, the sure-metal-handed cyborgs looked to be invincible, and with their court-length hook shots they were well on their way to mopping the floor with the Globetrotters. Coach Scatman Crothers intervened and in an impassioned speech to the front line of “Curly” Neal, “Sweet Lou” Dunbar and giantine biracial Abe “Meadowlark” Saperstein, he implored the lads to “Win One For the Skipper” — à la "The Gipper," a reference that eluded everyone courtside, but not Yours Truly Dooley™, who has an abiding respect for the lessons of the late fighting Irishman Newt Rockne, in not the stadium announcing nobody Ronald Reagan. Happily, the Globetrotters would dial up their A-Game — spinning the ball on their fingers, dribbling between their legs and sliding effortlessly across the sand court — and made mincemeat of the Invisibles. The following day, amidst the wreckage of the post game celebrations, the Globetrotters would board the plane, now powered by the iron ore or something, to continue their cross-continental playoff tour against arch enemies the Washington Generals, with Dawn Wells along for support and her promise that she’d send a rescue crew right on over, but alas, she lost the map pinpointing the islands whereabouts and wasn't even able to invite anyone to her pending nuptials to shiny-headed Mr. Neal.
