by gordie | Jun 14, 2021 | NBA, Philadelphia 76ers
Know this about championship basketball seasons: They are the ultimate group project, requiring something from just about everyone on the roster. There is no better example of that than Game Two of the Sixers-Hawks playoff series. The Sixers, who definitely harbor...
by gordie | May 23, 2021 | NBA, Philadelphia 76ers, Writing
Deep into a recent 40-minute telephone interview with former Sixers president Pat Croce, I raised the subject of death: How did he, as a 66-year-old cancer survivor, regard such a thing? “It doesn’t bother me,” he said. Well, of course. He has always been Mr....
by gordie | May 7, 2021 | NFL, Writing
I know of perhaps a half-dozen sportswriters and ex-sportswriters who, like myself, are fans of the Green Bay Packers — who have tended to text me on any given Sunday about the virtues of Clay Matthews and Kenny Clark, and the misadventures of Marquez...
by gordie | Apr 18, 2021 | NFL
The NFL Draft is fast approaching, heralded as always by a flood of analysis that alternates between the impressive and the amusing. How else could we find out that Clemson quarterback Trevor Lawrence, the likely No. 1 overall pick, has “fluid mechanics to easily...
by gordie | Apr 4, 2021 | College Basketball
The knee-jerk thing for a geezer like myself to say after Saturday’s Gonzaga-UCLA classic is that great as it was, it still doesn’t quite measure up to the 1992 Duke-Kentucky regional final. Gotta maintain perspective when it comes to a discussion of college...
by gordie | Mar 26, 2021 | College Basketball, MLB, Writing
On March 16, 2019, the East Stroudsburg University men’s basketball team lost an NCAA Division II first-round game to West Liberty, 106-99 in overtime. The silver lining for the Warriors that night at IUP was considerable, however: Freshman center Ryan Smith had...
by gordie | Mar 14, 2021 | NBA, Philadelphia 76ers
The way Michele (Telfair) Ramsey remembers it, there were two ways for a junior-high-aged girl to stand out in Canyon, Texas in the late 1970s — either become a cheerleader, or a basketball player. She was neither, but set out to become the latter. It was a...
by gordie | Feb 22, 2021 | NBA, Philadelphia 76ers
Charles Barkley turned 58 on Saturday, and I couldn’t help but think of something Jim Lynam, Barkley’s last coach with the Sixers, once told me about the Chuckster. “He’s a Hall of Fame player, so people have to appreciate it, but he’s special among that group,” Lynam...
by gordie | Feb 16, 2021 | High School Sports
Among other things, Leon “Buddy” Glover was known for walking everywhere — for lacing up his trademark black hightop Chucks and venturing out from his Green Street home in Lancaster. Didn’t matter how far he had to go. Didn’t matter if someone offered a ride....
by gordie | Jan 31, 2021 | College Basketball
John Chaney’s death on Friday at age 89 reminded me that I have held onto a cassette tape of a telephone interview I did with him in July 1999, when he was 17 years into his 24-year run as the men’s basketball coach at Temple. Took some rooting around to find it, but...
