Dedication and Hard Work Pay Off for ABL Longshot

This is about grit, competitiveness, drive, the will to succeed . . . the kind of stuff K.C. Jones talked about when he said he’d never had an NBA team play as hard as his New England Blizzard players do.

Darla Simpson is 27, 6-feet-3, a dead ringer for Lisa Leslie, has three jobs (two paying) . . . and has her size 12 sneaker wedged in the door of the women’s American pro game, her point proven.

In early January, Simpson was sitting behind the Long Beach StingRay bench at home games, one of four non-uniformed, non-paid practice players. They hope that, someday, they’ll be issued a uniform and paycheck.

A 1992 University of Houston graduate, she had a 5:30 a.m.-to 8:30 a.m. job at the Long Beach YMCA as a weight training instructor. Then she’d report to StingRay practice at Long Beach State, from noon to 2:30 p.m.

Then it was back to the apartment she shares with StingRay player Clarissa Davis-Wrightsil for a nap, then off to her 4-to-midnight shift at a Long Beach electronics store, selling cell phones and pagers.

She has no car. She walks, or takes the bus.

She didn’t have to go through this. She had played four pro years overseas, but in her last one, she played in four countries in one season.

“I was bouncing around overseas, I wanted to get settled in one of the American leagues,” she said.

She came to Long Beach.

And opportunity knocked on Jan. 6. Playing in Long Beach, Atlanta’s 6-3 Tracy Henderson went down because of a knee sprain. The call went out for temp help and Long Beach’s general manager, Bill McGillis, suggested Simpson.

A deal was done. Simpson signed on for the ABL minimum, about $4,700, for two weeks.

Before leaving, she told McGillis she was nervous.

Replied McGillis, “About what? Darla, you’ve been playing against Yolanda Griffith and Venus Lacy every day. You have nothing to worry about.”

In her first game for Atlanta, against Portland, Simpson literally had her playbook open on her knees on the bench when she heard player-Coach Teresa Edwards yell: “Simpson! Get in here!”

She made four of five shots, scored 13 points and grabbed five rebounds in 23 minutes. Nine days later, she played 19 minutes and had four points and three rebounds.

Henderson healed. Simpson is back in Long Beach as a practice player again. And she has her two other jobs back.

But she’s also now a lock to be in the ABL combine in May.

“She certainly showed us she can play at this level,” Edwards said.

“She surprised me, doing so well and not knowing a lot about our system.”

BRONCO VICTIMS

In December, Colorado Xplosion publicist Ted Simmons bemoaned how the Broncos dominate Denver’s sports pages.

“John Elways’s wife gets more ink in the Denver Post than we do,” he said.

So finally, you figure, with the Broncos winning the big prize Sunday, the Xplosion can catch a little attention in Mile High.

“Oh, no,” Simmons said.

“This is the worst thing that could have happened. The wind-down will take a month. Today [Monday] there’ll be 20,000 at the stadium for a celebration. Then there’ll be 300,000 to 400,000 for the parade Tuesday.

“And winning the Super Bowl probably means a lock for a new stadium, and people will be talking about that for months.”

SCHEDULE STUFF

The 1998 WNBA schedule is out and has the Sparks opening with three road games, starting June 11 at Utah and ending June 18 at Sacramento. Then comes a June 19-24 homestand, against New York, Houston and Charlotte.

Turning to the StingRays’ schedule--all right, stop crying, Maura McHugh--they didn’t help themselves with that 66-64 loss at Portland on Thursday.

The team is percentage points out of first place, behind Portland, and six of Long Beach’s final 11 games are on the road, making tonight’s game against Colorado at the Pyramid and the Feb. 1 and 3 home games against Atlanta and New England absolute musts.

Reason: The team’s last four are at New England, Atlanta, Columbus and Philadelphia. On that same trip three months ago, the StingRays went 2-2.