Nurses spark hoop memories during recent hospital stint

A recent stay at Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor – yes, another one – produced the following gifts: a bucket of homemade ice cream, a bushel of MacIntosh apples, and a bevy of basketball stories from a group of participating nurses.

In 1989, I was trying to make a comeback from a bad fall. Not only was I doing dialysis treatments at home, but I was five years into dealing with a disease that almost sidelined my teaching and coaching career.

One of my nurses talked me into applying for the head boys basketball job in hoop-rabid Machias Memorial High School, a place she had been a cheerleader.

Hmmm, I’m thinking. Maybe it’s time. I had been away from the game for two full seasons, attempting to recover from a nasty fall. Hours of physical therapy, midnight walks in my Essex Street home on my knees, and constant encouragement from the EMMC staff to push myself all factored into my decision to apply for the position.

As luck – and prayer – would have it, I became a finalist.

When the phone call came from athletic director Mike Worcester of Jonesboro, I was thrilled. “You got the job, coach. When can you start?”

On opening night against a talented Lubec Hornet team, coached by Down East legend Don Farrell, I was as nervous as a kid at his first spelling bee.

Could I still coach?

Would the boys still respond to me now that I’m in a wheelchair?

As I got jittery on the home bench, watching both squads take their preliminary warm-ups, out of the corner of my eye, I saw several of my nurses from the hospital enter the building.

I spoke to one of them.

“Nervous?” she asked.

“Nah,” I said, lying through my teeth.

She knew I was not telling the truth.

“What are you guys doing here?”

“It’s a special moment for you . . . and for us. We wanted to be here.”

I was so touched by the gesture that I gave the five of them short-cut directions out of Machias through the Black Woods and home to Bangor.

They got lost, of course, a story I still haven’t heard the last of. The 170-mile sojourn ended with snow, but a good time was had by all.

In 1999, my Eastern Maine Community College team was playing for a Maine Small College Conference championship. As the contest was winding down and we were protecting a slim lead, my wife said to me “Turn around.”

“Ah, I’m a little busy.”

“Turn around!” she said more emphatically.

I did.

Sitting together in the bleachers were six of my dialysis nurses, cheering their little hearts out.

When the gun went off, and the players raced out on the floor, cut down the nets, and began to prepare mentally for a crack at a national title, those six women were whooping and hollering like schoolgirls because of the pride they felt.

Thanks to my recent stay at EMMC, I had a chance to relive all of that again.

BDN columnist Ron Brown, a retired high school basketball coach, can be reached at bdnsports@bangordailynews.net