Excellent Sports Analogy with Final Carrie Scene

[LennyWolf]

1) In this first analogy I saw an IMMEDIATE connection between what happened in the fifth game of the 1970 NBA Finals (when the Knicks lost center Willis Reed early to injury and still overcame a double digit deficit to win this critical game against the Lakers) and the scene in the horror movie “Carrie” in which Carrie’s mother tried to kill her (played by Sissy Spacek). In the movie, Carrie had just come back from the disastrous prom (in which she ended up using her telekinetic powers to kill many of the students and teachers who had previously tormented her) and now finished bathing off the blood she had caked all over her body.

Carrie’s mother than seemingly tried to comfort her but then stabbed her daughter in the back with a kitchen knife. Carrie then rolled down the stairs and eventually her mom went ‘for the kill’ in the kitchen. Carrie then used her telekinetic powers to make many knives fly off the wall and into her mom, thus killing her.

The analogy was as follows: When Reed got injured (late in the first quarter with the Knicks already down 15-25) that represented Carrie getting stabbed in the back by her Mom. (In my mind Carrie’s Mom represented Laker center, Wilt Chamberlain. In first trying to comfort Carrie this represented to me how Chamberlain and the Knicks, especially their front office, always had a friendly relationship.) Carrie then rolling down the stairs represented the Knicks ‘trying to buy time’ in trying to stay in the game until half-time (when adjustments could be made). Her mom chasing her down the stairs represented Chamberlain ‘going in for the kill.’ (Without Reed in the game it seemed, at least on paper, that the Knicks had no one to defend Chamberlain.)

At half-time of that game Knick coach Red Holtzman (helped a little bit by Bill Bradley) set up a “zone offense” in which the Knicks would have five shooters in the game. Holtzman felt that this could work since Chamberlain was somewhat immobile (having come off of a knee injury that had sidelined him for most of the regular season) and would now be forced to guard one of these outside shooters. If he did not, the Knicks would have a number of open outside shots.

Carrie having rolled into the kitchen represented these ‘adjustments.’ When she made the knives fly off the wall and into her Mom that made me think of how the Knicks made outside shot after outside shot in the second half of this game. In addition, Carrie being far more mobile than her mom made me think of how the younger Knicks pressed the older Lakers into 20 second half turnovers. As the knives flew off of the wall, I thought as each one hit (“Bradley hits from 20, DeBusshere hits from 25, etc”). Her mom having ‘no defense’ for this represented to me how Chamberlain could not cope with the Knicks ‘zone offense’ in this game.

[GNTLGNT]

Whhhhoooo-weeeee! That's a "jump ball" of the mind, but a wowser of analogy nonetheless.....

[bobledrew]

Absolutely, Lenny. I also have discovered a disturbing number of parallels between the DT books and the Fischer-Spassky chess match of 1972, but I won't go into details here as I'm sure everyone knows that already.