PEOPLE

Spellbinding evangelist Oral Roberts, of the university of the same name, wanted to scout the ACC tournament in Greensboro in case one of the teams met his team in the NCAA playoffs. He called Dr. James Ralph Scales, president of Wake Forest, for tickets and was told he didn't have a prayer of getting any. Roberts said he would come anyway "on faith." Roberts came and, in the meanwhile, Dr. Scales came down with "light pneumonia." He left his tickets for Roberts. Roberts told the Wake Forest people he would pray for Scales' recovery. He didn't say when. Some folks suspected it would be after the finals.

"Somebody asked me the other night if hockey players take their teeth out when they make love to their wives," says Sandy Clarke, wife of Philadelphia Flyer Captain Bobby Clarke. "I nearly fell over. Actually, Bobby never has his teeth out at home, only when he's playing hockey. Of course, I can't speak for all our players."

Which is more important to a major league baseball club, a coach or a color commentator? We now have definitive word from John McHale, president of the Montreal Expos. McHale flatly turned down a request from Manager Gene Mauch that Duke Snider, the former Dodger star, leave the broadcasting booth to become the team's third-base coach, saying right out loud that a commentator was more essential. In other words, cool corn is more important than the hot corner.

Women's lib hit a new high (or low) in Sherbrooke, Quebec. Pat Boland, assistant (female) coach of the Loyola College girls' basketball team, punched a (male) referee. Furious after losing a game to the University of Sherbrooke, Mrs. Boland stomped over to Ref Guy Pariseau, informed him that he had just officiated the worst game she had ever seen, and delivered a fist to the stomach. She said, in her defense, that she hadn't hit the referee very hard. "If I had really let him have it, he would still be out," she said.

When their tournament at the Tucson Racquet and Swim Club was delayed by rain for two days, Stan Smith and John Newcombe, two of the fastest guns in professional rackets, visited Old Tucson—an amusement park and location for Western films—and had a ball. A tennis tournament at an Arizona swim club delayed by rain? Is that a joke? No. And neither are gunmen Smith and Newcombe to their opponents. This is the way they look from the other side of the net all the time.

Yugoslav soccer star Stanislav Karasi has just gotten himself headed by an opponent with the strength of a baby bull. Karasi, a member of the Red Star team visiting Spain for the quarterfinals of the Europe Cup championship, tried his hand at bullfighting at the Palomo Linares ranch. He proved again that soccer players aren't always very good hands, and in this case the footwork left a little to be desired, too.

The skiing pastor at Jack Frost Mountain in Pennsylvania's Pocono range realizes why his services are lightly attended. "I wish more would come in and talk, but I understand skiers," says 24-year-old John Heilner, who has been installed as a ministerial intern by the Pocono Lutheran Recreation Ministry in an A-frame chapel at the top of the slopes. "They don't get that much time to ski." The picnic bench pews in the unpainted pine interior of the chapel can seat 40, but Heilner is happy if half that many park their skis outside. He bears no malice, believing that "the Lord works in mysterious ways." As proof, on his jacket he wears a patch that says PRAY FOR SNOW.

This is Odd. But the question is, which Odd, Wayne or his twin brother Wes? Both are milers on the Rancocas Valley (N.J.) Regional High School track team. Even their mother sometimes can't guess the Odds. They really are the Odd couple, a long-running series.

That number 66 appearing as a designated pinch hitter for the Texas Rangers looked familiar, if perhaps a little out of place. Yep, that was country and Western singer Charley Pride, once a pitcher for the California Angels, who frequently works out with major league teams in the spring. "They released him in 1961," observed Third Baseman Jim Fregosi, who was an Angel then, "and he didn't have enough money to buy a tuna sandwich. Now he flies here from Dallas in his own jet just to work out with us." And Pride is not so out of place. In two at bats against Cy Young Award winner Jim Palmer of the Orioles, Pride-grounded out and hit a sharp single up the middle.

TWO PHOTOS