Rodman, Vegas ... bridal gown?

For fans who don’t have a rooting interest during the NBA’s All-Star weekend, how about this marquee matchup?

The Harlem Globetrotters, basketball’s goodwill ambassadors, against Dennis Rodman’s Bad Boy All-Stars.

The game is scheduled to take place Feb. 17 in Las Vegas as the second game of a Globetrotters doubleheader. In the first game, the Globetrotters will play their traditional rivals, the New York Nationals.

Rodman, always looking for an excuse to go to Las Vegas, is said to still be in the process of finalizing the Bad Boy All-Stars roster.

Maybe he can hold tryouts. Several members of the New York Knicks and Denver Nuggets have some time on their hands right now.

*

Trivia time

Where does Rodman rank on the NBA list of longest player suspensions?

*

He escaped from old St. Knick

Jalen Rose is looking for a few good poets.

The well-traveled NBA forward is playing host to his second annual Holiday Poetry Contest, asking participants to submit by Jan. 7 an original poem with a holiday theme. Winning entries will be featured on Rose’s website -- as soon as it is re-launched -- and Rose’s blog promises that the top five poems “will also win a surprise autographed holiday gift from Jalen!” Entries must be e-mailed to [email protected].

Curious about that surprise autographed holiday gift, Briefing throws its poet’s quill into the ring:

On Denver! On Indiana!

On Chicago! On Toronto!

Then over to the Knicks

And right on to Phoenix.

Six teams down

Twenty-four to go

Where will Jalen next stop?

Utah? Seattle? Boston?

Or Orlando?

*

Equipped with extra curve

A hockey stick purported to be the oldest in existence has been auctioned off on EBay for $2.2 million.

Seller Gord Sharpe said an anonymous buyer has agreed to put the hickory stick, believed to have been carved between 1852 and 1856, on display in the Hockey Hall of Fame.

Sharpe, a 45-year-old Canadian, said he was relieved to learn the buyer was from Canada. Twenty-six bids were submitted from around the world and inquiries came from such places as Australia, Dubai and Germany.

Proceeds from the sale go to fanscharity.com and its World Charity Award program, both run by Sharpe with the goal of promoting the importance and awareness of charities among children.

“I can still see the stick if I want in the Hall, and it meant a lot of money going towards our charity programs,” Sharpe told Canadian Press. “That was more important than keeping it.”

More than $2 million for a hockey stick?

That’s nothing. The hockey stick used by Marty McSorley in Game 2 of the 1993 Stanley Cup Finals cost the Kings a lot more.

*

Trivia answer

Seventh. Rodman was suspended 11 games and fined $25,000 for kicking a television photographer in January 1997.

*

And finally

Philadelphia Eagles Pro Bowl guard Shawn Andrews, to the Philadelphia Inquirer, on why he decided to shed nearly 60 pounds: “I’m tired of sweating when it’s 20 below ... and I don’t want to die because I ate too many cheeseburgers.”

*

[email protected]