No North Dakota would alter sports landscape

An 82-year-old man named John Rolczynski of Grand Forks, N.D., has discovered a state constitution error -- North Dakota does not require its governor and top officials to take an oath of office -- which technically disqualifies North Dakota as a state.

This got me to thinking about the novel ways 82-year-old Grand Forks men spend their free time, as well as how sports would be different if North Dakota wasn't a state.

For starters, Roger Maris, who grew up in Fargo, would have another asterisk tacked onto his name.

And what of Phil Jackson, who wrote about returning from a basketball game one night in Rugby, N.D., to his family's home in Williston, and being captivated by the spectacular northern lights while laying on the hood of a car? It was then he "understood the allure of this land of sky and wind, that those who have grown up in North Dakota, from Sitting Bull to the Hunkpapa Lakota to Roger Maris, the successor to The Babe, have been nurtured by the land -- a land that is hard but giving, just like its people."

Well, the former Bulls and Lakers and Albany Patroons coach would have been writing about a foreign land. He would have been writing about a buffer zone between South Dakota and the Canadian provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba, where a buffer zone probably isn't needed.

If North Dakota isn't a state, or wasn't a state, it would have given Ralph Engelstad, the former Imperial Palace kingpin by way of the University of North Dakota, where he played goalie, something else to complain about when the politically correct types up there wanted him to remove Fighting Sioux logos from the ice hockey palace he built.

And it would have forced Vikings and Twins fans in Montana to take the long way around to a ballgame.

Worse, I probably never would have gotten to see Hank Taken Alive -- one of the coolest names in sports -- play college basketball.

In 1982, I was covering the NAIA national basketball tournament in Kansas City, Mo., when Hank Taken Alive was playing for Mary College (now University of Mary) in Bismarck. Every time Hank made a basket and the public address announcer called his name, the crowd at Kemper Arena went crazy.

If North Dakota wasn't a state, it is doubtful that Mary College would have been invited to play in the tournament. And it is doubtful that years later I would have read a story about the Lakota Nation's passion for basketball in Sports Illustrated.

And I wouldn't have learned that Hank Taken Alive still is coaching high school basketball in North Dakota, and that he has a son named Ray Taken Alive, who was a pretty good player himself. And that the star of the 2003 Lakota Nation Invitational was a guard from the Pine Ridge Reservation named Elton Three Stars.

I wouldn't have learned any of this.

This is why North Dakota must start swearing in the governor with an oath of office as soon as possible.

THREE UP

■ Former Las Vegas Posse quarterback Anthony Calvillo threw two more touchdown passes for the Montreal Alouettes on Friday, giving him 396 for his career -- a Canadian Football League record. One might remember 13 of those came as a rookie with the Posse in 1994. And one might not.

■ The Vegas Sin of the Lingerie Football League will play only two home games at Orleans Arena in their inaugural season, against the Los Angeles Temptation on Nov. 11 and the Green Bay Chill on Jan. 21. A short season, and women playing football in their dainty things -- this might work.

■ I received a nice email from Morganna "The Kissing Bandit" about the column I wrote about her appearance at the 1990 Triple-A All-Star Game at Cashman Field. So drinking free beer with the great Gordie Howe in his hotel suite is no longer my career highlight.

THREE DOWN

■ Hassan Pena, a pitcher from Cuba, was wearing Bryce Harper's No. 34 jersey when the Las Vegas native was called up to Double-A Harrisburg. Now Pena is wearing No. 28. "We worked something out," Harper said, which might or might not have included Cohiba cigars and $1,200.

■ I'm hearing ticket sales for the season-ending IndyCar race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway aren't exactly brisk. Or, if you are one of those rose-colored glasses types who attended the NASCAR race at Kentucky on July 9, traffic problem solved.

■ Clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose. Friday nights won't be the same, now that the critically acclaimed "Friday Night Lights" has been canceled because of low ratings and/or Tim Riggins exhausting his eligibility.

Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ron Kantowski can be reached at rkantowski@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0352. Follow him on Twitter: @ronkantowski.