The Philadelphia Inquirer from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania • Page 23

Sports People 2 Horse racing 6 IC4Atrack7 High schools 7 Classified 9 section sports Saturday, May 22, 1982 Close to the edge Sixers march toward yet another spectacular suicide plunge ffi By BILL LYON en. We beat them in five. I guess there's never been a six-gamer." Domenico nodded. Erving seemed to remember then that Domenico has been the Sixers' medicine man for 20 years now. He is their link to the past in this raging, steamy series that is remembered more for Philadelphia failures than for Boston successes.

"You've been through all of them, haven't you?" Erving asked. Domenico nodded, sighed, taped. "Yeah, Doc," he said with the philosophical acceptance of a man who has both cashed in on the long shots and gone bust with the sure For what would be the most important game in the frustration-mottled history of the 76ers, Julius Erving had been the first to arrive. Almost two hours before tipoff at the Spectrum last night, the Doctor stretched his rubbery frame on the table and trainer Al Domenico began the timeless ritual of taping ankles. Domenico's hands wound and unwound, shuffled and smoothed, with the practiced nonchalance of a blackjack dealer machine-gunning the cards.

Erving stared at the ceiling, listening to his own breathing, tuning in to the vibrations, the omens, of his body, trying to perceive what might things. To Domenico, you're put on this planet and then you wait while the wheel of fortune spins. "It goes around," he told Erving, "it comes around." Mostly, when it has gone around it has taken the Sixers with it, and then dumped them unceremoniously somewhere between the. slag heap and the rubbish pile. The wheel came around again last night, and this time the Sixers flung themselves off of it and onto the jagged rocks below.

It was one of the more flamboyant suicide plunges in NBA history. Yes, they did it again. The team that needs an iron lung in the playoffs folded over with the bends again. Boston 88, Philadelphia 75. In the last 8Vj minutes, the Celtics outscored the Sixers, 21-8.

The Sixers scored 48 points in the first half and only incredibly 27 in the second. They faded with each tick of the clock, collapsing in the stretch, managing only 16 points in the third quarter and 11 in the fourth. That means that, when it mattered the most, they could not even muster a point a minute. They garrot-ed themselves. The tourists in Mexico have been (See LYON on 4-C) Ce Itics ti item noose on 88-75 win ties series, forces seventh game Up by 5, Phils go flat, 7-6 I rA In; vt iSS.

I By Jere Longman inquirer Stall Writer ATLANTA In other times, this might have been a choice spot to end a three-game losing streak. Atlanta, after all, has seldom been a contender since Sherman's march. The Braves have sometimes been lucky to make the cover of their own media guide. But something has happened. These are not the same Braves.

And, instead of curtailing a mild slump, the Phillies again pulled up lame. Last night, the Phillies built a 5-0 lead after three innings only to see it trickle away to a 7-6 loss. In retreating to .500 (19-19), the Phillies developed familiar symptoms. The poor fielding that stung pitcher Steve Carlton on Wednesday nighthaunted Larry Christenson and three Phillies relievers. Sparky Lyle (1-1) finally took the loss.

Then there was the hitting. Or the lack of it. After three efficient innings five runs on five hits the Phillies' bats fell back into a coma. They could produce only two hits in the last six innings one by Christenson, the other by pinch-hitter Greg Gross and one run. "We just stopped hitting after the third," Phillies manager Pat Corrales said.

So, a team that was sailing along a few days ago with 13 wins in 14 games has now lost four consecutive baseball games. Atlanta, on the other hand, continues to sprint ahead of the National League Western Division with a 26-13 record. The Braves have not been so far above .500 since their curtain-raising, 13-game winning streak. Particularly frustrating to the Phillies was the manner in which the Braves recovered last night. Atlanta's latest win was built on a brace of bloop singles and doubles in the four-run fifth inning.

It was some of the softest hitting since the Muhammad Ali-Trevor Berbick fight, but effective in any case. "They all count," a frustrated Cor-; rales said. "They couldn't have thrown them any better. "I'd rather get beat on a hard base 1 hit. These bloop base hits kill you.

1 It's frustrating. There ain't a thing you can do about it, and the 2 guy IChristensonl was still throwing (See PHILLIES on 5-C) happen when the Sixers and the Boston Celtics waded into each other yet one more time. "So here we go again," Domenico said, idly. "Yeah. But each one is different in its own way," Erving said.

"We beat them in seven and they won in sev Boston's Larry Bird (left), Rick By FRANK DOLSON Sports editor when you lose. Mr. Torre (Braves manager Joe Torre) is having a lot of fun over there right now. IBut he'll experience just what everybody else is experiencing this year before it's over." On the other hand, there won't be many big-league pitchers who will experience what Larry Christenson did last night in the bottom of the fifth inning. There he was, cruising along with a 5-0 lead, working on a two-hit shutout.

The first Braves batter in the fifth, Ken Smith, got a legitimate hit a line single to left. Then came the play that, in retrospect, set up Christenson for the kill. Catcher Bruce Benedict hit a fairly (See DOLSON on 5-C) i I Kevin McHale Leads Celtics with 17 points Billy Cunningham Been there before Actually, what you could see was the Sixers collapsing and doing it convincingly. After running their half-court passing game well for nearly all of three quarters, the Sixers suddenly caught themselves standing around the court like so many statues when the crunch of the game came in the fourth quarter. Normally, when that situation happens, the only thing that can bail them out is sizzling outside shooting by Andrew Toney.

But Toney at that point last night was not even in the game. Toney was in the middle of a miserable 1-for-ll night from the field, and Cunningham jerked him out of the lineup and went with a guard court of Mo Cheeks and Lionel Hollins. Clint Richardson, after playing only 8 minutes in the first half (he was 1 for 1), was banished to the bench for the entire second half. "I could have played," Richardson said dejectedly while leaving the locker room. "I just don't know why I didn't play.

I feel like I could have at least done something. I had a (See SIXERS on 4-C) identified as a potential buyer by league sources. Steinbrenner and Gilbert met Wednesday after the league recessed its board of governors meeting in New York City. The introduction was arranged by Bill Fugazy, the limou-' sine executive and one of Steinbrenner's close friends. Steinbrenner did not return phone calls Thursday and Gilbert would neither confirm nor deny Steinbrenner's interest.

"No comment," Gilbert said when reached at his home in Buffalo Thursday night and asked if Steinbrenner was interested in buying the team. "No comment," Gilbert said when asked if the sale remained a possibility. Although Steinbrenner's name was not mentioned at formal sessions during the league meetings, he is believed to have allies in William" Wirtz, the chairman of the ROCKIES on 4-C) Sixers By George Shirk inquirer Stall Writer The 76ers did it again. This team, which has dragged the art of folding to new lows, took it one step lower last night by coughing up another to the Boston Celtics, 88-75, before a packed house at the Spectrum. For Sixers fans, little could have been more painful to watch.

The Sixers, who had held a 3-1 lead in games in the NBA Eastern Conference final series, have allowed Boston for the second straight year to come back from such a deficit and force a seventh game. Last night, they accomplished this by collapsing in the second half after leading by as many as 15 points in the first. The parallels to last year's nightmarish series with the Celtics are, for the Sixers and their fans, downright frightening. Just like Game 6 last year, the Celtics did not win this one so much as the 76ers gave it away. It was a devastating collapse.

In the second half, the Sixers could manage only 27 points, the lowest point total for a half recorded in any NBA playoff game since the shot clock was introduced. Twenty-seven points. That's barely one point per minute, and with a 24-second clock at work, it's an almost unimaginable figure for a team that has advanced this far into the playoffs. Immediately after the game, Sixers like Bobby Jones knew what the questions were going to be and that they would be called chokers again. "I'd say back that and everybody else on this team, played as hard as we could tonight, and if they don't like it, then change the team or be satisfied with what we've done," he said.

And yet really, who could have been satisfied with what the Sixers did last night? After leading the Celtics by 15 points early on, and by three (64-61) at the end of the third quarter, the Sixers quite simply went into their springtime death march. They hit only three field goals in the entire fourth quarter, when they were outrebounded, 23-9. In all, they shot 15.8 percent from the field (3 for 19) in the final quarter, giving up 50 percent shooting to the Celtics. The Sixers held the lead until Boston center Robert Parish made it 69-67 for the Celtics. Then the Sixers wilted in the heat of their own collapse.

"It really turned around when they got the lead," said Sixers coach Billy Cunningham tersely. "You could see their emotion was shifting." tion with McMullen, who once owned 6 percent of the Yankees, but sold his interest in the team, declaring: "There is nothing so limited as being a limited partner of George's." McMullen is a former director of the American Ship Building of which Steinbrenner is president, and still owns more shares in the company than Steinbrenner does. He also is chairman of the Houston Astros. Like Steinbrenner, he can be an involved, impulsive baseball owner, but active only behind-the-scenes in his business dealings. McMullen, in fact, refused to disclose that he had even been negotiating to buy the Astros three years ago and was a late comer in his prospective purchase of the Rockies, who would play not far from his home in Montclair, N.J., if the franchise were to be moved.

Steinbrenner has not publicized his interest, although he has been Philadelphia inquirer APRil SAuL McHale rule the backboards JPhillies victimized xby bloops, not blasts i Steinbrenner's late purchase bid stalls decisions on NHL's Rockies Robey, Danny Ainge and Kevin George Steinbrenner Opposing old foe McMullen ATLANTA Normally, this isn't a ballpark, it's a launching pad. Baseballs fly out of Atlanta Stadium as if they were jet-propelled. There's nothing extraordinary bout blowing a five-run lead in this place. But ordinarily when that happens it's on 400-foot boomers, not 150-foot bloopers. The box score says that Larry Christenson got battered last night.

VThe box score is a liar. was jamming guys, hitting them right on the fists," Pat Corrales said in the wake of the Phillies' fourth straight defeat. "They couldn't have thrown them out there any better. You'd rather have them beat you on legitimate base hits." 'He picked up a piece of paper, crumpled it into a tight, yellow ball and threw it away. This was one that would be hard to forget, a seemingly routine victory suddenly turned into an agonizing defeat.

VThose bloop hits, they kill you," sighed the Phillies manager. "It's frustrating. Not a damn thing you can. do about it. It's a lot of fun when you win.

It's not much fun By Pat Calabria and Tim Moriarty Newsday Service NEW YORK George Steinbrenner, owner of the New York Yankees baseball team, is trying to purchase the Colorado Rockies, a troubled National Hockey League franchise that is expected to be moved to the Mead-owlands Arena next season. Colorado owner Peter Gilbert already has an offer from John McMullen, a former partner and now an adversary of Steinbrenner. The National Hockey League appeared ready to approve the sale of the Rockies to McMullen, but recessed efforts to complete the agreement earlier this week after 19 hours of discussions spread over two days. League officials would not comment on the reason for the sudden delay, but sources indicated there were new buyers interested in the Colorado franchise. That put Steinbrenner in competi- 1.