Sport: Word from the Wise

Don Sensato is a pensive Argentine comic-strip character who specializes in simple solutions for everyday problems. Last week, while Buenos Aires was agog at the size of the visiting Phillips Oilers basketball team (Center Bob Kurland is 7-ft. tall), Don Sensato had this to say: “It occurs to me that the only way to win from .. . the tall ones … is to play low.”

Playing on a tile-floored court and using a ponderous outdoor-style basketball with outside seams, a picked Argentine five followed Don Sensato’s advice. They used the bounce pass almost exclusively, scooted under and around the Oklahomans who were runners-up for the A.A.U. championship last year, actually beat them (55-46) in the second of three games (the Oilers had won the first, 38-29). The fans, who could scarcely believe their eyes, carried the local heroes away on their shoulders and the Buenos Aires Critica proclaimed that it was “David and Goliath all over again.” Even though the Oilers won the finale, 71-52, Argentine sponsors felt so good about the whole thing that they were dickering with the Oakland (Calif.) Bittners, the A.A.U. champs, to come down next.