July 28, 2025 • 47 mins
Heather and Heidi Burge inspired the film “Double Teamed” and now 23 years later, they’re sitting down with Will and Sabrina to talk about their lives and how they the DCOM came about.
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Speaker 1 (00:14):
Thank you everybody for joining us on our par copper episode.
Oh I do this all the time.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
I've backed myself into the special corner because I always
say it's a special episode.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
But this one is.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
We're doing a bonus special episode because this was so cool.
This is a first on Magical rewind where we're not
interviewing Disney Channel Royalty. We're not interviewing We're not even
interviewing actors or singers or writers. We're interviewing the people
that made the movie possible because they are what the
movie is about. Oh my gosh, we are talking about
(00:47):
the actual twins from Double Teamed. So cool because you know,
what was based on a true story and we get
to talk to them today to find out how their
real life story got aid into a d com.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
I'm so excited to get kind of this side of
the thing is so cool.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
Could you imagine I would freak out if Disney wanted
to do a movie about my life?
Speaker 4 (01:13):
This is going to be amazing. I'm so excited.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
I don't think they would do that for me. I
can't imagine they're being their casting ten year old smokers
to do the Disney Channel movies that wouldn't be a
good thing, but.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Anyway, can you please help us?
Speaker 2 (01:26):
Welcome Heidi and Heather Burge. Hey, how are you both
doing good?
Speaker 1 (01:36):
Thank you so much for joining us. I don't know
if you know our mission here.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
We were watching all the Disney Channel original movies and
talking about them.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
We're very happy and for the first time ever, we
get to talk to the people that the movie was
based around based on, which is so cool.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
And I'm just wondering if you could tell us how
did this even come to pass?
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Did Disney call you?
Speaker 2 (01:56):
How to what happens when you get the call from
Disney Channel saying we want to do a movie about you.
Speaker 5 (02:00):
So we had both been playing overseas basketball professionally for
at least four seasons or five it must have been
more than that five seasons or no, four seasons, and
a singer entertained Singer White Entertainment. It wasn't even Disney
this entertainment. I guess it's a firm. They decided to
(02:21):
make a basketball movie for Disney Cable about a girl,
a female basketball player. And they know they got a
hold of me because they had my information in the
media guide of the very first nineteen ninety seven WNBA.
Heather wasn't playing because she was injured, and I was
on the LA Sparks, our hometown, and it was so
(02:43):
cool and they said, hey, you're one of the five
top five finalists in all the girls of the league.
I thought, that's awesome, but I'm like, I'm not.
Speaker 6 (02:50):
Going to get it, you know.
Speaker 5 (02:51):
I figured there's so many other people with dramatic stories,
and I thought, and they liked the drama in my life.
They liked was that I had a heart surgery when
I was a baby, and they didn't think my parents
didn't think I would have a normal life right becaus
the doctor said so anyway, So they picked that because
of the drama. And then they found out I had
a twin and they didn't even know that because they
(03:11):
had to research more about my life. It wasn't like
Google back in nineteen ninety seven. It wasn't just everything.
So they figured out, oh, she's a twin, and Heather
and Heidie were the we were the tallest female identical twins.
All this stuff, and they said, we want to make
the movie about you. And that's when they started the
writing process, and it was three years of writers. Then
they sold that product to the Disney Wowes in two thousand.
(03:36):
They wrote they had three writers in three different years
ninety seven to two thousand. Meanwhile, Heather I was actually
exiting the league with an injury. Heather gets in the
league and then the third writer. They finally have their
polished script. They submit it to Disney, and Disney buys
it and they don't even film and release until two
thousand and two. So it's kind of fun to learn
that it's like a five year You really don't even
(03:58):
know when it's gonna pilot, you know.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Yeah, geez, So Okay, So when when you were growing
up was well, I guess the way I want to
want to phrase it is how how close to real life.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Did the movie stick to you? I mean?
Speaker 2 (04:13):
Was it was the things we were seeing as you know,
you're moving from different schools and moving all over the place,
and you started players and you didn't then didn't want
to play. It was all this true to life.
Speaker 7 (04:23):
They did, Uh, They did take the major themes of
our lives, like the big move and having to fit
into the new whole wealthier neighborhood because we grew up
middle class and things like that.
Speaker 6 (04:36):
So I think those were portrayed perfectly.
Speaker 7 (04:39):
They added they added things to make it more drama,
like the girl that was really bad on the team
and was little girl's off the team, and the and
the guy and the guy that was like sweet looking
guy who we were We were so tall. We were
taller than most the boys basketball players, so we didn't
have a huge pool of guys.
Speaker 6 (05:01):
You know, it was kind of hard.
Speaker 7 (05:03):
That was hard during those dating years, you know, or
height of years.
Speaker 6 (05:08):
But they like I was really impressed that the gal
that was.
Speaker 7 (05:11):
Playing me Poppy Monroe together and I was still playing
in France when this was being recorded, and she would
write me to see like is this accurate?
Speaker 6 (05:23):
Would you do this?
Speaker 7 (05:25):
And even down to the details of what we were
wearing and things like that. They did it all. They
did really well. Like the double bike we had that
tandem bike.
Speaker 4 (05:35):
Did you really.
Speaker 7 (05:38):
Yes, they found the swin double bike that we ended
up selling at a garage sale.
Speaker 6 (05:43):
I can't believe my mom soeld that at a garage sale,
but it was like the best bike. And then they
did the washing cars so we never had.
Speaker 7 (05:52):
To My dad never paid for these, like across the
nation trips with Junior Olympics and all these things we
did after we after we joined club so High school
was one thing, and then they they said, you know what,
there's this club that's very interested in you, and it
was you know, Cheryl Miller, Reggie Miller's sister was one
of the pioneers of this So Cal basketball club, and
(06:13):
so we went out, tried out, and of course they
took us because we were we had potential.
Speaker 6 (06:17):
We didn't even.
Speaker 7 (06:17):
Barely make layups. So that was a non accurate part
of that movie. They made it look like we were
brand new to this sport and that we actually made
everything Like if you look how many shots were missed
barely any.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
Well, that's what I think we really we literally looked
it up. It was something like I think we wrote
it down. There wasn't a shot missed, No one misses
a basket until an hour and forty minutes into the movie.
Speaker 5 (06:41):
Well, that was an awesome stat you guys did, because
not other people, they don't think about that, but it's
so you're exactly right.
Speaker 4 (06:49):
Oh my god.
Speaker 6 (06:51):
Kid's always asked those questions.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
Well, yeah, it's amazing.
Speaker 6 (06:54):
I wanted to add something.
Speaker 5 (06:56):
See how Heather overlooked something that was pretty important to
me because if you remember, Heidi is always in heather shadow,
one second best, always second best. So they made this
up and it wasn't. So they had Heather this porto
and Hattie was like in her little under her shadow.
(07:17):
And actually I was the volleyball player. Heather didn't even
get to play volleyball. Freshman year, I was on.
Speaker 6 (07:23):
The I've played. I didn't play. Senior year, I played.
Speaker 5 (07:27):
I know you were injured with the foot ankle from
the scooter accident in Oregon and you didn't get to well,
you had to join mid season, but anyway, she didn't.
I made the team. But particularly I told my mom
this was the big thing. I love volleyball and I
want to play on the circuit. I want to be
with Pat Zartman and the USA Olympics. I was going
and I went to start workout. I got on the
(07:48):
club team for volleyball. They don't mention any of that.
They have Heather as the volleyball player, and Hettie's just
sort of like always trying to be as good as Heather.
And so I was volleyball, and then Heather joined later
after her injury healed. That's what I remember and then
we both played, and then we both played volleyball, and
then I didn't want to As you know, the story goes,
I didn't want to play basketball because I was already
(08:10):
doing volleyball.
Speaker 6 (08:10):
And my dad's like, yeah, my dad's like, just like
next Jersey does not look like our dad.
Speaker 5 (08:16):
But I'd say yes, He's like, you are playing you're
only fourteen years old or you're thirteen, not even fourteen,
And he's like, you're gonna give it a try one
season because your sister's gonna do great and you're gonna
miss out and you're gonna be regretful.
Speaker 6 (08:31):
So you're gonna play one year. If you don't like
it after that, you can quit.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
And volleyball and basketball are two different seasons at school, right,
so you were able to do both within one year.
But yeah, I mean, and it'll keep you in shape
some you know, as far as like agility and training
and things like that.
Speaker 4 (08:50):
So yeah, I get it.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
Was it true that you were at all interested in
wanting to do drama and venture out.
Speaker 6 (08:58):
So the heather, Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 7 (09:00):
So we had this guy named Jim Bell at PV
High who was a famous actor from like The Bell
Tolls or something some old sixties like sitcom or something
he was.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
I was like, that's cool.
Speaker 7 (09:12):
I want to go out and learn how to learn
drama from this guy. And we when we went to
New York for the Tournament of Champions, it was not
for some drama play, you know, so like they we
went out, We went out for a basketball tournament and
got to go to New York.
Speaker 6 (09:29):
So that was true.
Speaker 7 (09:30):
But the drama I ended up taking into college even
at UVA, so I minored in drama, okay, And there
was famous people like Sylvester Salons like UVA had Jessica
Lang and Sam Shepherd and like a lot of famous
people went through there on in drama, and I always
was interested in it.
Speaker 4 (09:49):
So, wow, that's cool, wasn't I was.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
The thing with that also amazed us was because so
the casting of the film was interesting because obviously they
didn't get identical twins, but they kept lines in like
how do you tell them apart? And I was kind
of screaming at the screen, like, because they're two different people,
you can easily tell them apart. But one of the
other things that we found really interesting was that when
(10:14):
the film started and you're on the bikes and all
that stuff. You're supposed to be twelve or thirteen at
the start of the movie, And I was like, aren't
they in their late twenties?
Speaker 1 (10:25):
Like the women that are playing you.
Speaker 6 (10:27):
You can sEH like not a lot of people the
youth that watch it.
Speaker 7 (10:30):
Like I'm a teacher now, and I just showed it
like just before Easter break, and the kids were all like,
that's you.
Speaker 6 (10:38):
Well, I'm like, my gosh, I'm fifty four. What are
you talking about?
Speaker 1 (10:43):
That is not me.
Speaker 6 (10:45):
You're not fifty four, We're fifty three.
Speaker 7 (10:47):
Okay, this year will be fifty four. I don't see
how she has to always correct me.
Speaker 6 (10:55):
So funny.
Speaker 3 (10:56):
Oh that's true, though, what your age do you teach?
Speaker 7 (11:01):
Oh?
Speaker 6 (11:01):
I teach fourteen, fifteen six?
Speaker 3 (11:03):
Okay, So I swear that's when I saw this movie.
I was the first time I watched it while it
was out, and I remember not thinking anything about the
fact that these actors look so much older than high
school kids, junior high kids, and then like you know,
be now going back and watching it like will and
(11:25):
I could not get past it because and then instead
of because I think they were trying to you know,
which I think was probably just a huge part of
your guys' story was, like you said, you being just
such young women that were so tall.
Speaker 4 (11:40):
They tried to really show that.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
But in order to do that, they did, in fact
hire eleven year.
Speaker 4 (11:46):
Olds and twelve year olds to be.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
Years old.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
The extras were, but the actors playing the main roles
were so big.
Speaker 4 (11:56):
There was just such a huge difference in age between
the actor.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
So it was definitely something I don't remember watching when
I first watched the movie, and then now it's like, okay, yeah, no,
those those girls, those ladies are not they are not
teenagers in any sort.
Speaker 7 (12:12):
Yeah, your lenses were different. And of course it's so
funny too. They like I said, they called us, well,
I don't know if any McClellan called Heidi, but I
thought it was so mature of the girls to call
us and to make sure it was. I was like, wow,
that's the quality actress who will make sure she's portraying
(12:33):
it exactly like I would want it or do it.
And also they put big platform shoes on them, so
they're they're wearing like if you if you really look closely,
you can see like that big of a riser on
their basketball shoes and stuff, and they were like their
dancers and is like, I have a new respect for
basketball players.
Speaker 6 (12:52):
I am so sore. That's they kept so sore after
these basketball workouts.
Speaker 2 (12:57):
You know.
Speaker 6 (12:59):
So I was like, hey, yeah, we you know it's hard. Run. Yeah,
you know, it's great. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
Was there was there any hesitation at the beginning of
telling your story? Was there any party that was like,
I'm not sure that we want anybody to do a
movie about our lives?
Speaker 6 (13:13):
Oh? Well, hesitation? Our father it was a lawyer.
Speaker 5 (13:17):
So and he has many lawyer friends, not in the
entertainment business, real estate law. But you know, once you're
a lawyer and you realize how they could manipulate and
they could make your dad a.
Speaker 6 (13:28):
Raging alcoholic when he's not.
Speaker 5 (13:30):
I mean, you do sign a document and this was
it was pretty when you read it. The document that
we released. We released the rights for them to make
any story. And my dad's like, we're not sign that,
you know, And I was like, okay, okay, chill.
Speaker 6 (13:46):
So I got uh And he's now deceased.
Speaker 5 (13:49):
But Jerry Gottlieb, we used to be the head MGM
lawyer back in the day, back in the early nineties.
Speaker 6 (13:54):
Sure, and I called him up.
Speaker 5 (13:56):
I said, Jerry, I'm w NBA player and he's like,
I want to do the contract for you in Disney.
He goes, and just just remember they'll write all that stuff.
But there I'm looking to be malicious. Yeah, and he
kind of gave me you have to know someone that
knows the ins and outs, right, And he really consoled
my dad most.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
I'm the son of two lawyers as well, so I
know exactly what that's.
Speaker 6 (14:18):
Like, right.
Speaker 3 (14:19):
I agree, being a part of Disney, you, I'm hoping
that would ease your guys is concerned a little bit
that they're not gonna.
Speaker 4 (14:26):
Really do any kind of dark backstories. But even still, as.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
A parent, you know, you want to make sure that
you're not ever being portrayed as somebody who over pushed
or overdid this. You know, especially when you guys know
what your real journey was. You know it's it's yes,
he might have pushed you into doing something, but it
was to keep you, to make making sure you didn't
have any regrets later, you know, wanting to follow your
(14:51):
dream and yah, and how hard it is, and I mean,
look at him, he clearly.
Speaker 4 (14:56):
He did a great job. You guys both had an
incredible career after.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
You guys pushed and worked so hard during high school
and that's amazing.
Speaker 7 (15:03):
Yeah, he pushed us, and they portrayed it a bit,
and it's funny. All the people who know us outside
of the basketball world actually inside too. They were like,
your dad pushed you so hard, you know, And it's
so funny because now that I'm a mother and my
husband's like, we're not pushing our kids, and I was.
Speaker 6 (15:22):
Like, that was totally foreign to me, right, it was
so weird. So not to go into personal, but it's
like there's so different views of how to mold and
and you know.
Speaker 7 (15:35):
You know, my dad didn't have to push me as
much because I was the more obedient ones.
Speaker 6 (15:39):
So I didn't even see it at all that way.
And then they're putting it out there on the.
Speaker 7 (15:44):
On the show and I'm like, oh, yeah, I guess
it kind of looks like he's pushing us, you know,
you know what I mean, Like because I was more
of the subservient loans that would just do it, you know,
and that didn't feel like pushing to me.
Speaker 6 (15:56):
I was just supposed to do what I was supposed
to and that's.
Speaker 7 (15:59):
And a lot of people these days see it and
they're like, not pushing my kids because there was you know,
I mean, how do He had to overcome that too,
because it was kind of punishing to her personality, which was,
why are you trying to make me be something I'm not?
Speaker 6 (16:13):
And that's the.
Speaker 7 (16:14):
Big underlying theme that a lot of people won't read
into it, especially youth, is like twins always get treated
as their one person and not two totally different personalities
even though you look like on the outside, and that
I think we were. That was portrayed well with the fighting,
because we fought and fought and fought to try to,
you know, be individual.
Speaker 4 (16:34):
Be your own person.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
Yeah, I have twin nephews and my sister from day one,
we and to be honest, like it wasn't on purpose
or anything, but we would use.
Speaker 4 (16:45):
Them or they a lot.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
And my sister was so adamant, no, it's good Hunter
and it's Coulton.
Speaker 4 (16:53):
It is not them, It is not you know she she.
Speaker 3 (16:55):
Has always made it such a big deal and at
first it was kind of like, I'm just I mean,
I'm just talking about both of them at the same time.
That's so that's why I'm using them and they and
but now with both of their personalities, they are two
totally different kids into totally different things. And I'm so
glad that she, you know, really advocated for them, because
(17:15):
you see that and hear about that with twins quite
a bit, you know, wanting to be seen as their
own person, not not the same, you.
Speaker 7 (17:22):
Know, and they coaches can see it in certain ways,
but people don't. They don't even realize they're doing it,
like they those twins, they do this, they do that.
Speaker 6 (17:34):
I'm like, what you know, Wait, yeah.
Speaker 7 (17:37):
I.
Speaker 4 (17:40):
See, I'm the opposite. I have prayed so hard my
whole life to be a twin, and.
Speaker 3 (17:44):
Then when I became, when I told her kids, all
I wanted was twins. I wanted so bad my dream.
Speaker 4 (17:52):
What a.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
Twins run in my family too, So I was very
really prayed.
Speaker 1 (18:00):
For it, and I wanted a twins.
Speaker 4 (18:04):
I never was a toWin and I never got them.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Dang it. Were you able to visit the set at
all as they were shooting?
Speaker 6 (18:17):
No, no, they filed in Salt Lake City.
Speaker 5 (18:19):
They did ask us to be in that last scene
where they throw up the WNBA ball in the game
and we're going against each other, which never happened because
I got injured. I got injured with a pretty bad
back injury in ninety nine and had to be released
for Greham. And Heather just got into the league what
in two thousand, two thousand, so she literally we would
(18:42):
have played against each.
Speaker 6 (18:42):
Other that season. It's so ironic.
Speaker 7 (18:45):
It's so ironic that we were prosed for eight years
and never once played a professional game against each other.
Speaker 6 (18:51):
Even they had to make it, you know, yeah, even.
Speaker 7 (18:54):
The same town in France. We were both hurt when
we had to play each other.
Speaker 6 (18:59):
And then the WNBA, whenever she was in, I was out.
It was weird. And then I was just finishing up
May thirty first, and.
Speaker 7 (19:08):
They were gonna do that last scene June second or something,
and I just couldn't fly back from France fast enough.
Speaker 6 (19:15):
She was overseas. Yeah, that's what it was. So they
wouldn't wait, they wouldn't.
Speaker 4 (19:18):
Wait for like, yeah, seriously, that would have been so epic.
Speaker 7 (19:25):
Way better, you know, like just even put us in
a gym anywhere. I'll fly to Houston and just.
Speaker 6 (19:30):
Throw up the ball, you know. Yeah, yeah, that's the
way it to work.
Speaker 5 (19:33):
You know, whatever can I interject on the real quickly
about the last thing that you guys said and how
they were saying about personalities we you know, just to
reiterate what she said is we are on dientical on
the outside, very very black and just opposite on personality.
Speaker 6 (19:49):
And my dad was my dad, and I buck ted's
because we're.
Speaker 5 (19:52):
Both very hard, strong willed, hard headed, and back then,
if you remember it was eighties, it was early the eighties.
It was eighty five. We started high school. There was
no there wasn't even a circuit for volleyball. I was
really just going to choose do Olympic. I just wanted
to do it with a great coach and do a
great program and made me play some.
Speaker 6 (20:12):
Beach tournaments and that was it. And there was no WNBA.
Speaker 5 (20:15):
We didn't know much about scholarships, so I didn't ever
think about I surely didn't think about playing basketball in
college because I didn't like basketball.
Speaker 6 (20:23):
Right, and then he makes me play.
Speaker 5 (20:25):
But what I'm saying is I bucked him so bad,
but because I wasn't old enough. And I think the
best I think the best thing to remember is not
only the context that this was recreational.
Speaker 6 (20:37):
This was not a you're gonna be a pro. You
got to do it now, you know. And it wasn't that.
Speaker 5 (20:42):
And then the second thing was I use payback is
sweet because every day every I coach hundreds of kids
in Houston, Texas, and I say, father's no best, and
the dads are watching, going yeah.
Speaker 6 (20:58):
And I'm like, I was you. I told my dad
I don't want to try it.
Speaker 5 (21:02):
I don't even want to do it, and he's like, no,
You're doing it one season and that's it. And so
all the parents love it, and I get to kind
of use that as a you know, kids listen to wisdom,
right well.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
So, well, now you forced is the wrong word.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
You were told that maybe it would be best if
you played a season.
Speaker 5 (21:19):
No, no, no, no, Larry Birch didn't didn't like tell
you it was best.
Speaker 6 (21:23):
You're doing it?
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Okay?
Speaker 6 (21:26):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (21:27):
How long did it take after you stepped on the
court for you to find a love for it on
your own?
Speaker 5 (21:32):
That's a great question. You know how I told you,
I'm very stubborn and strong willed. Oh, I was going
to make sure my dad was miserable for the first
few days.
Speaker 6 (21:40):
I was going to come home and stall.
Speaker 5 (21:44):
And make sure I hated him. I hate you. If
he's watching television, I hate you. I was so bad
and I'm helpful attest to it. But I remember the
turning point. I was starting.
Speaker 6 (21:57):
You have to sweat so much in basketball. That was
the funniest thing.
Speaker 5 (22:00):
Volleyball you stand still a lot in his calfs ring.
You don't really sweat outside. But in the gym, I
started sworting, like, I absolutely do not like this.
Speaker 6 (22:10):
And then after two.
Speaker 5 (22:12):
Weeks, it was two weeks, I was like, pee wee started.
Heather was doing really great at shooting free throw. She
was starting free throws and getting layups and I couldn't
do any of it. And I was like, mold be
durned if I'm gonna do it, just to feed her, right,
That was my first motivation after I met was mad
at my dad.
Speaker 6 (22:29):
Then I was like, gosh, basketball is kind of fun.
Then you go really fast and.
Speaker 5 (22:36):
It makes your brain work on all these levels of
like so different than volleyball. There's no net separating you
from the opponent and they can hit you while you shoot,
and it was like this whole dynamic that was it
was definitely after two weeks.
Speaker 4 (22:49):
Okay, so two weeks that's pretty quick though.
Speaker 7 (22:53):
I mean I literally, if you ask me what when
she liked it, I would have said when I got in,
I actually had pneumonia, not an ankle injury for our
queens in senior year, so I actually had to sit
out for two.
Speaker 6 (23:07):
Months right in the middle of the season.
Speaker 7 (23:09):
And I thought, literally, that's the when she started liking
it because she was wearing forty four points again.
Speaker 6 (23:16):
She just needed that time to shine all by herself.
Speaker 7 (23:19):
You know, if you would have asked me, I would
have swore, she said not for years, I had no
idea that much.
Speaker 6 (23:27):
Father have we never talked about this. I don't remember
ever talking about this. I remember lots of things.
Speaker 5 (23:33):
Let it be on the record. It was two weeks
because it was so fast and fun. I realized, Heather,
why would I play it because all the way to
senior year.
Speaker 7 (23:44):
That didn't make me wanted to Because you wanted to
play nation, we got to go on the club team.
Speaker 6 (23:50):
Yeah, well, I stayed with it.
Speaker 5 (23:52):
After after two weeks there was a turning point and
I started being intrigued.
Speaker 6 (23:56):
By all the challenges, and I love challenges.
Speaker 5 (23:59):
If you tell me I can't make a layup, iile
show you.
Speaker 6 (24:02):
You know, that's how we both are. That's kind of
hard for We're both like that. So we do this
a lot.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
Oh man, So wait, okay, so the movie comes out.
Were you together when you saw it? Was there a premiere?
How did how did that work?
Speaker 6 (24:15):
Oh?
Speaker 7 (24:15):
I was in California and she was in Texas. It
was in two thousand and two, January two thousand and two.
Speaker 5 (24:21):
I remember January eighteenth, two thousand and two, and we called.
We were on the phone live with dad and mom.
I don't remember if my mom was on the phone.
It was the funniest what you guys said comes full circle.
Speaker 6 (24:34):
Yeah, yeah, they're minikey every show.
Speaker 5 (24:36):
Did you see that they've made every shot out?
Speaker 6 (24:42):
We looked like we did not make any shocks.
Speaker 7 (24:47):
We had so many rebounds because of bricks against the backward.
Just constantly throwing your phone and we would catch it
and we we launched it.
Speaker 6 (24:55):
It was so bad. We tell our kids that when
we're coaching, do not thing that that is real. It'll
never happen.
Speaker 7 (25:03):
You got to work at it, and that's oh yeah,
just keep working at it.
Speaker 6 (25:07):
You know.
Speaker 1 (25:07):
So, did did one of you have the special move?
Or was the special move totally made up.
Speaker 6 (25:11):
The weird traveling.
Speaker 3 (25:14):
That move was not special praveling.
Speaker 2 (25:21):
It has become I don't know if you're aware of this,
but it has become a meme on the internet. Is
considered the worst sports scene ever filmed.
Speaker 7 (25:28):
I know, I saw a guy doing one of those
commentaries on a reel or something, and I was laughing
because I'm like, what did they take a six year
old kid and say, here, make a move or something
like figure that one.
Speaker 4 (25:42):
Actually, it looks like it was pretty okay.
Speaker 3 (25:56):
So you guys are done the movies out now, you
guys have also had your career. At what point, because
when we did the review, the amount of especially young
women who said this was the movie that pushed me
to want to be in the WNBA, that wanted me
to even start playing basketball.
Speaker 4 (26:17):
At what point?
Speaker 3 (26:18):
How long did it take for you guys, Because you
had to have just someone after someone coming up to
you guys and saying like that DCOM was a turning
point for me, right, I mean, it was such an
inspirational movie for so many young women out there.
Speaker 6 (26:33):
Yeah, I mean it just it just took off.
Speaker 4 (26:36):
And was it like immediate or what it was for me?
Speaker 7 (26:41):
I don't know. I wasn't even in that crowd. Like
I wasn't coaching at that time.
Speaker 6 (26:45):
You know. It was funny.
Speaker 7 (26:47):
A lot of people know about it, even and not
out of basketball. So yes, I would run into all
the time. Oh they're the ones that made the Disney movie.
Oh my gosh, that was so good, you know. And
even now, these kids they weren't even born time teaching,
they weren't even born. But everybody knows this movie. They
I think ESPN, ESPN made a top three or not.
Speaker 6 (27:09):
ESPN was top three did like all star Disney movies.
And we were with the Super Bud and High School.
Speaker 7 (27:16):
Musical and they as a you know, like I was like, whoa,
they watch it that much that I guess the.
Speaker 6 (27:23):
Original number one original movie. And I was like, oh,
they really like kids really like this one.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
Well what did you What did your teammates think? I mean,
you were still playing when it came out, weren't you?
I mean did the teammates?
Speaker 6 (27:34):
No, we were done.
Speaker 1 (27:35):
Oh you were done by that time.
Speaker 7 (27:36):
Yeah, And she had been injured for she had been
out for a couple of years. So I was actually
just going back to school, you know, like trying to
figure out. I knew I was going to be a
teacher since like sixth grade, so I went back for
credential and stuff like that.
Speaker 5 (27:48):
Wow, I was coaching the Hoop School, which is what
I do in Houston, Texas, and it's been a really
great It's just been awesome to be able to share
the movie with the kids. So during summer camp, it's
like our whole tradition. Now on Friday, anybody who goes
to full day camp gets to watch the movie at lunch, and.
Speaker 6 (28:05):
We watch because you only get a forty five minute lunch, so.
Speaker 5 (28:08):
We watch half the movie on Thursday and half the
movie on Friday. But more than that, it's the fourteen
year olds that are they realize what you were saying.
It's like it's a changing point for them when they
see that I was stubborn and they're identifying with the
stubborn little thirteen or fourteen year old that thinks he
doesn't want to play and her dad made her and
(28:29):
father's no best And you just got it in your
face and you actually liked the movie. Jeez, you know,
because the endgame is you win, you know, the kid wins.
I win, And now I'm doing something I even tell
the kids, I'm here before you today coaching in a
sport that I didn't want to play, and I ended
up making a career out of it and got to
(28:50):
travel the world and play in the WNBA. The top
eighty players of the world were in ninety seven, ninety eight,
ninety nine the first three years. Then they add a
team and so Heather was part of that group too.
This has been an amazing journey, and it was because
my dad wouldn't put up with stubborn me.
Speaker 3 (29:10):
Right.
Speaker 1 (29:11):
How did your dad feel about the movie?
Speaker 6 (29:15):
And I think they liked it? He said it was
well done.
Speaker 5 (29:19):
Both of our parents liked it. My mom wasn't a
big well she was a big fan of being portrayed
by you.
Speaker 6 (29:28):
Phillips because of the old days of you know, other stuff.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
I can see that, yes, but and my mother, and.
Speaker 6 (29:35):
I don't think she did justice to my sweet, gracious mother.
But she did a great job.
Speaker 8 (29:39):
Try okay yo, who now questions, going back to your
to your professional days, who's the best player both of
you have ever played against?
Speaker 6 (29:56):
Good question?
Speaker 7 (29:58):
M M.
Speaker 6 (30:00):
We were so lucky to play with such great players.
Speaker 7 (30:03):
And yeah, Don Staley by far the one that just
got runner up team national championship. She's she is the
most selfless player ever in the and and as a
person too, she's and even like we were, she was
(30:24):
a sophomore, we came in and we dropped half the
passes because she she had grown up playing with guys
and her passes were like behind the back, and we
would just she lost it so many times with this,
but but never ever like was punishing towards us. She
could have been so rotten if she wanted to, and
yet she was so such an amazing strong player. She's
(30:50):
a four time Olympian.
Speaker 1 (30:51):
I was gonna say, she's a mainstay in the Olympia
and the Hall of.
Speaker 5 (30:55):
Famer in women's and the men's Naysmith Hall of Fame. Okay,
so does everyone know? I mean, I don't know if
the audience knows that Heather and I were honored to
play under We were with Don Staley at University of
Virginia for three years her sophomore, junior, and senior years,
and we went to three final fours. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
Amazing.
Speaker 6 (31:16):
Yeah, So I.
Speaker 5 (31:17):
Agree with Heather that Don Staley would be the highest
remarkable player on the basketball court as well as person
that you'd want to be influenced by because of what
Heather said.
Speaker 6 (31:30):
She brought everybody up.
Speaker 5 (31:32):
She was always you know, she would work so hard
and just lead by example, which you see from a
person like Caitlyn Clark nowadays, but you see a lot
more girls talking about it or doing things that are
more ego centric. Don was very She was surrendered to
winning at all costs, and that meant she knew it
(31:53):
meant team.
Speaker 6 (31:54):
It wasn't just her.
Speaker 5 (31:55):
She might score thirty points, but actually on that team,
we had so many good players.
Speaker 6 (32:00):
She might get twenty two because.
Speaker 5 (32:02):
Heather got twelve and I got eight and Tammy got
you know, we had so many great players scoring equal
amounts of points.
Speaker 6 (32:09):
And that was another great thing about her.
Speaker 5 (32:10):
She wasn't just like I'm gonna gun it and score
my forty and you all just wait for the ball.
Speaker 3 (32:15):
Right.
Speaker 6 (32:15):
That's why our team did so well because it was
really a team.
Speaker 7 (32:18):
Yeah, that was a really great dynasty there because of that.
Speaker 6 (32:22):
And yeah, she also coached at Temple. She went back
to her roots, which she was from Philly.
Speaker 7 (32:29):
Coached at Temple, did well, but then got that South
Carolina job and then won three national championship championship.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
Yeah, they were Yukon before Yukon. Yes, that's right, yeah.
Speaker 7 (32:39):
Yes, And you know what, she the first one she
won because we literally lost every national championship. We made
it to the final game once, we made it to
the final four three times, we never won. We never
beat Stanford, we never beat Tennessee to go to it anyway.
So the first win her national championship, she made a
(33:00):
replica of each of the trophies with a plaque to
each of her teammates from those ones that lost, and
wrote once what is denied, delayed but not denied, delayed
but not denied, what is delayed is not denied.
Speaker 6 (33:18):
And then she literally sent us each totally unannounced.
Speaker 7 (33:21):
We got this passage and it's an NCAA Fund the
Championship trophy with our name.
Speaker 6 (33:27):
And I was like, she is so unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
Yeah, that was really cool.
Speaker 4 (33:32):
So rad, Oh my gosh.
Speaker 5 (33:35):
Yeah, she's that kind of person. You read more matter
in the in the news and things you'll see lately.
She's just bought a car for a janitor that didn't
have wheels. She gave a girl a nine hundred dollars
tip at the Bethay restaurant because she could tell the
girls struggling, you know, just because she's that and you
know she's never had money. If you knew where she
came from, she was from the projects in Philly. Ye,
(33:57):
she got a degree through basketball, She got a degree
at the University of Virginia. Has become and has become
one of the best coaches because and we have to say,
all of us have to know, just remind everybody that
we we are products of amazing coaches. Yes, and Down
is clearly a product of Debbie Ryan and all the
other coaches that have made her who she is on
(34:19):
the court. And now she's winning, winning championships and winning
going to the final four final game again this year.
Speaker 2 (34:24):
Yeah, I have to say, so, both my parents went
to Yukon and it was it was my mom was
the one who taught there's three boys, but she my
mom played basketball in high school, so she's the one
who taught us how to play basketball. And so Yukon
Basketball Toss was always the women's team.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
So we've been we've.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
Been following Yukon basketball for my basically my entire life.
Speaker 6 (34:44):
So well, Gino was Debbie's assistance assistant.
Speaker 7 (34:48):
Yeah, before week came there and and Tanya Cordoza, another
player that was on those dynasty teams, is his assistant to.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
This Day's amazing that she was from like.
Speaker 6 (34:59):
New jer is he or something.
Speaker 7 (35:00):
A lot of the coaches from New Jersey on our
staff on our team. But it's just like we did
have like a.
Speaker 6 (35:06):
Family unit there and w was like the mom, you know, she.
Speaker 7 (35:10):
Took care of us like her kids, and we had
a different you know, nowadays with Nil and everything, you
miss out on building that dynasty over a four year
period because anything can change, right, Yeah, But it's just
like don is Don's still the same today as she
was the first day we met her.
Speaker 6 (35:31):
And I like, she came here to La to play UCLA.
Speaker 7 (35:34):
In November which was our birth our birthday, and I
went up to the game and gave her a big
hug and she sat there and talked to me and
my my third son, and it was like, this is
so cool.
Speaker 6 (35:44):
You know, she's going to be anyone different. She's down,
you know.
Speaker 2 (35:48):
Yeah. Are you happy with the direction of the w
NBA specifically has been taking lately.
Speaker 6 (35:55):
Yeah, somewhat in regards to which which do you mean, Well.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
There's certainly there's certainly more publicity around the w NBA
than there has been for a while. Some people would
argue it's not all good, it's negative. Yeah, that's so yeah.
I mean it's in the zeitgeist, but maybe not necessarily
for the right reasons.
Speaker 5 (36:14):
Well we have that would be a long discussion that
we don't have time for.
Speaker 6 (36:18):
But no ex kidding, But I think my.
Speaker 5 (36:22):
My thing is, uh, you know, what wins is humility,
and you don't see a lot of humility right now,
and what wins is Clayton Kaitlin Cloark has humility still
and I don't know if she will be changed. You know,
she's early in the league and we I've known people,
right if you know people have been from zero to famous,
they it changes them. Sure, I think your biggest plight
(36:44):
as that person that's getting into stardom or fame or
money is that.
Speaker 6 (36:49):
You don't lose who you are.
Speaker 5 (36:51):
And I think and so you know, in their defense
people it's weighs them. So I'm not I don't want
to be judgmental, but I'm also you reckon it for
what it is, sure, And I do think humility just
attracts And we would love to see more of that
going on, right.
Speaker 6 (37:09):
And I watched the draft. I watched the WNBA.
Speaker 7 (37:12):
Draft and you know, it was good, it was exciting.
It's so it's so different, you know, than thirty years ago.
I can't believe I'm saying thirty years ago. You know
that it started almost thirty years ago. That's hard to
even fathom that we're that old. But it's nice that
there's so many opportunities. It's really nice for the girls
(37:33):
that there's so much to look forward to where, you know,
But at the same time, with the nil and everything else,
it's just a little I think, I don't know, I
feel like too much focused on money and rather than
the love of the game.
Speaker 6 (37:47):
So that's just my thinking.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
By the way, pagebackers number one, the number one draft.
So very very very excited.
Speaker 6 (37:53):
It's awesome.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
She's phenomenal. She really is awesome.
Speaker 7 (37:56):
And from Texas TCU, Oh, Tidy, you sent me her
he reels the one about.
Speaker 6 (38:04):
From TCU, How do you live in Texas?
Speaker 2 (38:06):
You can't.
Speaker 6 (38:07):
I can't remember the name, Heather.
Speaker 5 (38:09):
I know what you're saying, Yes, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 7 (38:14):
Yeah, I mean there's a lot of opportunities and international players,
you know, it was so different back when we were
When we first went over in ninety three, they were
only allowed two foreigners per team. So every country team
was like a high school team in some respects if
they were middle ground and then they got they paid
players like us to come over and make their teams.
(38:35):
Then a couple of years into it, it was Bosman rule,
where if anyone in Europe could just be floating around
and be considered not a foreigner. So we had no
French people on my number two team, Like starting lineup,
it was.
Speaker 6 (38:50):
Belgian, you know, English. It was weird. It was weird.
Speaker 7 (38:53):
But so yeah, so now there are a lot of
foreigners are coming here, which is good, you know.
Speaker 6 (38:58):
Yeah, strengths the world's amazing.
Speaker 2 (39:00):
Well, okay, last question, we're twenty years later. What do
you think the legacy of double teamed is going to be.
Speaker 5 (39:11):
Well, that's that's something you got to think about.
Speaker 6 (39:14):
Yeah, you want how do you want to say it?
Or you want to say what you do? You can
go first, we'll each have our answer. I think the
legacy of dreaming big.
Speaker 7 (39:25):
And going for setting goals high and going for it
no matter what, not allowing prior knowledge or anything, just
to get in your way, not allowing doubt or those
type of things, and just setting gold and going for
them the dream of, you know, finish doing something great
(39:48):
that a young person can have even.
Speaker 6 (39:51):
If they've never played before.
Speaker 7 (39:53):
And I also see the under the theme that had
he was talking about about listening to your parents, you know,
listen to your dad. You know, the father knows best
type of thing, don't I don't see that being as
big as the other one. Like I tell the kids
who the kids don't dream now, it's like said, go
(40:14):
for everything, give it, don't hold back, you know, And
so that would be what I would say. If you
know people are watching it twenty years from now, I'm
hoping they're seeing that.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
Yeah, that's great.
Speaker 5 (40:26):
I like the central theme to me was father knows
fathers know best because and you have to remember what
Heather just said didn't apply to me.
Speaker 6 (40:33):
I wasn't dreaming about being a basketball player. And there
I was.
Speaker 5 (40:37):
They're approaching me when I'm twenty seven years old. They're
approaching me about making a movie about a girl basketball player.
And I didn't even want.
Speaker 4 (40:43):
To be one.
Speaker 6 (40:44):
So that was right, I mean, isn't that funny? And
then the other thing. I like, they showed how the
rich it was. To me, it was we moved up
from Ridondo Beach.
Speaker 5 (40:58):
Ridondo Beach is not a it's a middle class whatever,
you know, neighborhood. Whereas we went up to Palace Verdes,
which was an affluent area, right, and they had these kids.
We were living in some sandy shores, right, So we
were in the ghetto of pollis urge, which there is
none and we didn't live in the sandy stores. We
(41:20):
lived in you know, we lived in a very nice
condominium complex, but we did live in a smaller, you
know place, and we were sort of the underdogs because
we didn't have the money that this one kid, Nikki,
remember in the movie, you see these rich kids, and
then she all she wanted. She didn't want that money.
She just wanted her dad to come to a game.
And that, to me, that is that's really great for
(41:43):
kids to see because they all are sidetracked right now
with I just want to be rich because rich people
have it made.
Speaker 6 (41:51):
Well, she didn't have it made. And guess what, at
the end, she ended up.
Speaker 5 (41:55):
Coming to our lame apartment for a lame sandwich that
my dad made it or my mom made it.
Speaker 6 (42:00):
You remember it was the chili.
Speaker 5 (42:02):
Now you gotta hear this, the real truth on that
one chili, corn chip, cheese dog or whatever it was
smashed together in the in the.
Speaker 6 (42:10):
Grill form and grill thing.
Speaker 5 (42:12):
Our our actual sandwich that was very unique to our family.
Speaker 6 (42:17):
This is the.
Speaker 1 (42:19):
Yes, yes, yes.
Speaker 6 (42:22):
The document.
Speaker 5 (42:23):
By the way, all of this stuff is in the
document that I wrote years ago called fact v Fiction
about the Disney movie.
Speaker 6 (42:29):
And I'll give it to you if you want to
put in.
Speaker 5 (42:31):
The notes of these so so they're gonna get a
real sandwich. The real sandwich was the Bird family was.
Thank you to Mary Birge, our health food mother. She
would have wheat bread, peanut butter, and lettuce, no nothing else.
Speaker 7 (42:48):
That's it.
Speaker 6 (42:50):
Jelly had sugar, no sugar, no jelly because jelly makes
the peanut butter.
Speaker 5 (42:56):
No, no peanut butter makes the jelly stick to your
teeth and you get cavity.
Speaker 6 (43:00):
Yeah, yeah, that was my mom.
Speaker 1 (43:02):
Peter, are we talking? Is this iceberg lettuce? I can't
believe we've been asking this.
Speaker 6 (43:06):
This is green leafy lettuce. No, you have to have
the darker greens. They have more vitamins. Come on, Williams.
Speaker 7 (43:14):
Yes, that actually, Heidi and I make everyone laugh because
we still eat those today.
Speaker 1 (43:20):
I'm trying one.
Speaker 4 (43:21):
Literally, I honestly don't think it sounds awful.
Speaker 6 (43:25):
I think it just smotherney. Yeah, smother it, smother it
with honey, it's even better.
Speaker 4 (43:33):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (43:34):
So it's just called the birch.
Speaker 6 (43:35):
Yeah yeah, And.
Speaker 7 (43:41):
If it was, if it was up to my dad,
we'd be going to Tommy Burgers for chili burgers.
Speaker 6 (43:46):
Yeah, my dad.
Speaker 7 (43:47):
You all know Tommy Burgers. Yes, that would be his thing,
for sure.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
I'll take. I'll be honest, I'll take. I'll try the
other sandwich. I'll try a birge, but I'd rather have
the Tommy Burger over the over the birge, if I'm
honest with you. Oh, thank you both so much for
joining us. This was great and.
Speaker 2 (44:05):
Such a treat for us to actually get to talk
to the people the movie was about. We haven't had
a chance to do yet, so this is really really cool.
This is the this is the neatest thing ever. So
thank you so much. And uh yeah, well, you know,
come back and watch another movie with us. Sometimes we'll
do something nothing to do with anything else.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
You could just come and.
Speaker 4 (44:21):
Play yes.
Speaker 7 (44:29):
You guys, okay, bye bye man.
Speaker 1 (44:35):
That was cool.
Speaker 7 (44:36):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (44:37):
First of all, hearing them kind of go after each
other like siblings is the greatest thing ever.
Speaker 4 (44:43):
Oh man, twins.
Speaker 3 (44:45):
It's like because they also have that twin connection that
they are already expecting to call out the sentence that's
about to come out of their twins' mouth.
Speaker 1 (44:55):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 3 (44:55):
So they're instantly just like on it, like there's no
beats in between.
Speaker 4 (45:00):
They just like they Oh man, I love it.
Speaker 2 (45:03):
I can't wait to read the fact fact v fiction
thing because I can't wait to see what because I
love how they're like, all right, this was right, that's
not so right?
Speaker 1 (45:09):
This is right. Like little things like they had the
double bike. We were like, who rides around in a
double bike?
Speaker 7 (45:14):
I know.
Speaker 5 (45:16):
It.
Speaker 4 (45:16):
I can't even believe it.
Speaker 2 (45:18):
So this is this is why I said this was
my favorite dcom of all time.
Speaker 1 (45:22):
This is this is why I said it's Rina.
Speaker 2 (45:24):
We all know why I vote voted this as high
as I did, And it's such a.
Speaker 3 (45:28):
Great true they you just want to keep watching it,
and I'm like, we've already done it our episode, you
don't need to do it again.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
But that was really really great little bonus episode together that.
Speaker 3 (45:40):
They're both still coaching and still mentoring out there and
something that they clearly were huge just yea huge presence
in such a you know, just.
Speaker 2 (45:51):
They're also the og when you're there the first season
of the w NBA.
Speaker 1 (45:56):
I mean, you are the pioneer. You're making this happen,
which is just so cool.
Speaker 2 (46:00):
I would love to I think I could have done
another hour on just what they think of what's going
on in the league and what Oh, I know everything.
I'd love to hear opinions of people that know it
a lot better than I do, to hear you know.
Speaker 3 (46:11):
Everything, experienced it and are able to kind of see
through the different aspects of what's going on right now.
You know a lot of positivity, but you know a
lot of things to probably kind of bring focus to
as well.
Speaker 2 (46:24):
Yeah, that was really cool. Everybody, go try a bird sandwich.
Speaker 1 (46:28):
Do give that a shot.
Speaker 4 (46:29):
I think I really actually might do it.
Speaker 2 (46:31):
Which say wheat bread, peanut, butter, and lettuce, let us
and then covered it honey.
Speaker 6 (46:36):
Covered honey.
Speaker 5 (46:37):
What the hell?
Speaker 1 (46:38):
It sounds like.
Speaker 2 (46:39):
Something you eat at two o'clock in the morning when
you're stoned thank you so much for joining us on
this park Opper episode that was a ton of fun.
Speaker 1 (46:46):
And don't forget to join us over on our other feed,
where we find the good, the bad, the medium, the ones.
Speaker 2 (46:52):
We remember, the ones we don't remember, the ones we
talk about, the ones we don't talk about.
Speaker 1 (46:55):
We're watching all the d coms, but.
Speaker 2 (46:57):
We've got to start wrapping it up because we only
have seventeen thousand left, so we're on the way.
Speaker 1 (47:04):
Thanks everybody for joining us. We'll see you next time. Bye.
Thank you everybody for joining us on our par copper episode.
Oh I do this all the time.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
I've backed myself into the special corner because I always
say it's a special episode.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
But this one is.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
We're doing a bonus special episode because this was so cool.
This is a first on Magical rewind where we're not
interviewing Disney Channel Royalty. We're not interviewing We're not even
interviewing actors or singers or writers. We're interviewing the people
that made the movie possible because they are what the
movie is about. Oh my gosh, we are talking about
(00:47):
the actual twins from Double Teamed. So cool because you know,
what was based on a true story and we get
to talk to them today to find out how their
real life story got aid into a d com.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
I'm so excited to get kind of this side of
the thing is so cool.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
Could you imagine I would freak out if Disney wanted
to do a movie about my life?
Speaker 4 (01:13):
This is going to be amazing. I'm so excited.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
I don't think they would do that for me. I
can't imagine they're being their casting ten year old smokers
to do the Disney Channel movies that wouldn't be a
good thing, but.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Anyway, can you please help us?
Speaker 2 (01:26):
Welcome Heidi and Heather Burge. Hey, how are you both
doing good?
Speaker 1 (01:36):
Thank you so much for joining us. I don't know
if you know our mission here.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
We were watching all the Disney Channel original movies and
talking about them.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
We're very happy and for the first time ever, we
get to talk to the people that the movie was
based around based on, which is so cool.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
And I'm just wondering if you could tell us how
did this even come to pass?
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Did Disney call you?
Speaker 2 (01:56):
How to what happens when you get the call from
Disney Channel saying we want to do a movie about you.
Speaker 5 (02:00):
So we had both been playing overseas basketball professionally for
at least four seasons or five it must have been
more than that five seasons or no, four seasons, and
a singer entertained Singer White Entertainment. It wasn't even Disney
this entertainment. I guess it's a firm. They decided to
(02:21):
make a basketball movie for Disney Cable about a girl,
a female basketball player. And they know they got a
hold of me because they had my information in the
media guide of the very first nineteen ninety seven WNBA.
Heather wasn't playing because she was injured, and I was
on the LA Sparks, our hometown, and it was so
(02:43):
cool and they said, hey, you're one of the five
top five finalists in all the girls of the league.
I thought, that's awesome, but I'm like, I'm not.
Speaker 6 (02:50):
Going to get it, you know.
Speaker 5 (02:51):
I figured there's so many other people with dramatic stories,
and I thought, and they liked the drama in my life.
They liked was that I had a heart surgery when
I was a baby, and they didn't think my parents
didn't think I would have a normal life right becaus
the doctor said so anyway, So they picked that because
of the drama. And then they found out I had
a twin and they didn't even know that because they
(03:11):
had to research more about my life. It wasn't like
Google back in nineteen ninety seven. It wasn't just everything.
So they figured out, oh, she's a twin, and Heather
and Heidie were the we were the tallest female identical twins.
All this stuff, and they said, we want to make
the movie about you. And that's when they started the
writing process, and it was three years of writers. Then
they sold that product to the Disney Wowes in two thousand.
(03:36):
They wrote they had three writers in three different years
ninety seven to two thousand. Meanwhile, Heather I was actually
exiting the league with an injury. Heather gets in the
league and then the third writer. They finally have their
polished script. They submit it to Disney, and Disney buys
it and they don't even film and release until two
thousand and two. So it's kind of fun to learn
that it's like a five year You really don't even
(03:58):
know when it's gonna pilot, you know.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Yeah, geez, So Okay, So when when you were growing
up was well, I guess the way I want to
want to phrase it is how how close to real life.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Did the movie stick to you? I mean?
Speaker 2 (04:13):
Was it was the things we were seeing as you know,
you're moving from different schools and moving all over the place,
and you started players and you didn't then didn't want
to play. It was all this true to life.
Speaker 7 (04:23):
They did, Uh, They did take the major themes of
our lives, like the big move and having to fit
into the new whole wealthier neighborhood because we grew up
middle class and things like that.
Speaker 6 (04:36):
So I think those were portrayed perfectly.
Speaker 7 (04:39):
They added they added things to make it more drama,
like the girl that was really bad on the team
and was little girl's off the team, and the and
the guy and the guy that was like sweet looking
guy who we were We were so tall. We were
taller than most the boys basketball players, so we didn't
have a huge pool of guys.
Speaker 6 (05:01):
You know, it was kind of hard.
Speaker 7 (05:03):
That was hard during those dating years, you know, or
height of years.
Speaker 6 (05:08):
But they like I was really impressed that the gal
that was.
Speaker 7 (05:11):
Playing me Poppy Monroe together and I was still playing
in France when this was being recorded, and she would
write me to see like is this accurate?
Speaker 6 (05:23):
Would you do this?
Speaker 7 (05:25):
And even down to the details of what we were
wearing and things like that. They did it all. They
did really well. Like the double bike we had that
tandem bike.
Speaker 4 (05:35):
Did you really.
Speaker 7 (05:38):
Yes, they found the swin double bike that we ended
up selling at a garage sale.
Speaker 6 (05:43):
I can't believe my mom soeld that at a garage sale,
but it was like the best bike. And then they
did the washing cars so we never had.
Speaker 7 (05:52):
To My dad never paid for these, like across the
nation trips with Junior Olympics and all these things we
did after we after we joined club so High school
was one thing, and then they they said, you know what,
there's this club that's very interested in you, and it
was you know, Cheryl Miller, Reggie Miller's sister was one
of the pioneers of this So Cal basketball club, and
(06:13):
so we went out, tried out, and of course they
took us because we were we had potential.
Speaker 6 (06:17):
We didn't even.
Speaker 7 (06:17):
Barely make layups. So that was a non accurate part
of that movie. They made it look like we were
brand new to this sport and that we actually made
everything Like if you look how many shots were missed
barely any.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
Well, that's what I think we really we literally looked
it up. It was something like I think we wrote
it down. There wasn't a shot missed, No one misses
a basket until an hour and forty minutes into the movie.
Speaker 5 (06:41):
Well, that was an awesome stat you guys did, because
not other people, they don't think about that, but it's
so you're exactly right.
Speaker 4 (06:49):
Oh my god.
Speaker 6 (06:51):
Kid's always asked those questions.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
Well, yeah, it's amazing.
Speaker 6 (06:54):
I wanted to add something.
Speaker 5 (06:56):
See how Heather overlooked something that was pretty important to
me because if you remember, Heidi is always in heather shadow,
one second best, always second best. So they made this
up and it wasn't. So they had Heather this porto
and Hattie was like in her little under her shadow.
(07:17):
And actually I was the volleyball player. Heather didn't even
get to play volleyball. Freshman year, I was on.
Speaker 6 (07:23):
The I've played. I didn't play. Senior year, I played.
Speaker 5 (07:27):
I know you were injured with the foot ankle from
the scooter accident in Oregon and you didn't get to well,
you had to join mid season, but anyway, she didn't.
I made the team. But particularly I told my mom
this was the big thing. I love volleyball and I
want to play on the circuit. I want to be
with Pat Zartman and the USA Olympics. I was going
and I went to start workout. I got on the
(07:48):
club team for volleyball. They don't mention any of that.
They have Heather as the volleyball player, and Hettie's just
sort of like always trying to be as good as Heather.
And so I was volleyball, and then Heather joined later
after her injury healed. That's what I remember and then
we both played, and then we both played volleyball, and
then I didn't want to As you know, the story goes,
I didn't want to play basketball because I was already
(08:10):
doing volleyball.
Speaker 6 (08:10):
And my dad's like, yeah, my dad's like, just like
next Jersey does not look like our dad.
Speaker 5 (08:16):
But I'd say yes, He's like, you are playing you're
only fourteen years old or you're thirteen, not even fourteen,
And he's like, you're gonna give it a try one
season because your sister's gonna do great and you're gonna
miss out and you're gonna be regretful.
Speaker 6 (08:31):
So you're gonna play one year. If you don't like
it after that, you can quit.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
And volleyball and basketball are two different seasons at school, right,
so you were able to do both within one year.
But yeah, I mean, and it'll keep you in shape
some you know, as far as like agility and training
and things like that.
Speaker 4 (08:50):
So yeah, I get it.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
Was it true that you were at all interested in
wanting to do drama and venture out.
Speaker 6 (08:58):
So the heather, Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 7 (09:00):
So we had this guy named Jim Bell at PV
High who was a famous actor from like The Bell
Tolls or something some old sixties like sitcom or something
he was.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
I was like, that's cool.
Speaker 7 (09:12):
I want to go out and learn how to learn
drama from this guy. And we when we went to
New York for the Tournament of Champions, it was not
for some drama play, you know, so like they we
went out, We went out for a basketball tournament and
got to go to New York.
Speaker 6 (09:29):
So that was true.
Speaker 7 (09:30):
But the drama I ended up taking into college even
at UVA, so I minored in drama, okay, And there
was famous people like Sylvester Salons like UVA had Jessica
Lang and Sam Shepherd and like a lot of famous
people went through there on in drama, and I always
was interested in it.
Speaker 4 (09:49):
So, wow, that's cool, wasn't I was.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
The thing with that also amazed us was because so
the casting of the film was interesting because obviously they
didn't get identical twins, but they kept lines in like
how do you tell them apart? And I was kind
of screaming at the screen, like, because they're two different people,
you can easily tell them apart. But one of the
other things that we found really interesting was that when
(10:14):
the film started and you're on the bikes and all
that stuff. You're supposed to be twelve or thirteen at
the start of the movie, And I was like, aren't
they in their late twenties?
Speaker 1 (10:25):
Like the women that are playing you.
Speaker 6 (10:27):
You can sEH like not a lot of people the
youth that watch it.
Speaker 7 (10:30):
Like I'm a teacher now, and I just showed it
like just before Easter break, and the kids were all like,
that's you.
Speaker 6 (10:38):
Well, I'm like, my gosh, I'm fifty four. What are
you talking about?
Speaker 1 (10:43):
That is not me.
Speaker 6 (10:45):
You're not fifty four, We're fifty three.
Speaker 7 (10:47):
Okay, this year will be fifty four. I don't see
how she has to always correct me.
Speaker 6 (10:55):
So funny.
Speaker 3 (10:56):
Oh that's true, though, what your age do you teach?
Speaker 7 (11:01):
Oh?
Speaker 6 (11:01):
I teach fourteen, fifteen six?
Speaker 3 (11:03):
Okay, So I swear that's when I saw this movie.
I was the first time I watched it while it
was out, and I remember not thinking anything about the
fact that these actors look so much older than high
school kids, junior high kids, and then like you know,
be now going back and watching it like will and
(11:25):
I could not get past it because and then instead
of because I think they were trying to you know,
which I think was probably just a huge part of
your guys' story was, like you said, you being just
such young women that were so tall.
Speaker 4 (11:40):
They tried to really show that.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
But in order to do that, they did, in fact
hire eleven year.
Speaker 4 (11:46):
Olds and twelve year olds to be.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
Years old.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
The extras were, but the actors playing the main roles
were so big.
Speaker 4 (11:56):
There was just such a huge difference in age between
the actor.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
So it was definitely something I don't remember watching when
I first watched the movie, and then now it's like, okay, yeah, no,
those those girls, those ladies are not they are not
teenagers in any sort.
Speaker 7 (12:12):
Yeah, your lenses were different. And of course it's so
funny too. They like I said, they called us, well,
I don't know if any McClellan called Heidi, but I
thought it was so mature of the girls to call
us and to make sure it was. I was like, wow,
that's the quality actress who will make sure she's portraying
(12:33):
it exactly like I would want it or do it.
And also they put big platform shoes on them, so
they're they're wearing like if you if you really look closely,
you can see like that big of a riser on
their basketball shoes and stuff, and they were like their
dancers and is like, I have a new respect for
basketball players.
Speaker 6 (12:52):
I am so sore. That's they kept so sore after
these basketball workouts.
Speaker 2 (12:57):
You know.
Speaker 6 (12:59):
So I was like, hey, yeah, we you know it's hard. Run. Yeah,
you know, it's great. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
Was there was there any hesitation at the beginning of
telling your story? Was there any party that was like,
I'm not sure that we want anybody to do a
movie about our lives?
Speaker 6 (13:13):
Oh? Well, hesitation? Our father it was a lawyer.
Speaker 5 (13:17):
So and he has many lawyer friends, not in the
entertainment business, real estate law. But you know, once you're
a lawyer and you realize how they could manipulate and
they could make your dad a.
Speaker 6 (13:28):
Raging alcoholic when he's not.
Speaker 5 (13:30):
I mean, you do sign a document and this was
it was pretty when you read it. The document that
we released. We released the rights for them to make
any story. And my dad's like, we're not sign that,
you know, And I was like, okay, okay, chill.
Speaker 6 (13:46):
So I got uh And he's now deceased.
Speaker 5 (13:49):
But Jerry Gottlieb, we used to be the head MGM
lawyer back in the day, back in the early nineties.
Speaker 6 (13:54):
Sure, and I called him up.
Speaker 5 (13:56):
I said, Jerry, I'm w NBA player and he's like,
I want to do the contract for you in Disney.
He goes, and just just remember they'll write all that stuff.
But there I'm looking to be malicious. Yeah, and he
kind of gave me you have to know someone that
knows the ins and outs, right, And he really consoled
my dad most.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
I'm the son of two lawyers as well, so I
know exactly what that's.
Speaker 6 (14:18):
Like, right.
Speaker 3 (14:19):
I agree, being a part of Disney, you, I'm hoping
that would ease your guys is concerned a little bit
that they're not gonna.
Speaker 4 (14:26):
Really do any kind of dark backstories. But even still, as.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
A parent, you know, you want to make sure that
you're not ever being portrayed as somebody who over pushed
or overdid this. You know, especially when you guys know
what your real journey was. You know it's it's yes,
he might have pushed you into doing something, but it
was to keep you, to make making sure you didn't
have any regrets later, you know, wanting to follow your
(14:51):
dream and yah, and how hard it is, and I mean,
look at him, he clearly.
Speaker 4 (14:56):
He did a great job. You guys both had an
incredible career after.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
You guys pushed and worked so hard during high school
and that's amazing.
Speaker 7 (15:03):
Yeah, he pushed us, and they portrayed it a bit,
and it's funny. All the people who know us outside
of the basketball world actually inside too. They were like,
your dad pushed you so hard, you know, And it's
so funny because now that I'm a mother and my
husband's like, we're not pushing our kids, and I was.
Speaker 6 (15:22):
Like, that was totally foreign to me, right, it was
so weird. So not to go into personal, but it's
like there's so different views of how to mold and
and you know.
Speaker 7 (15:35):
You know, my dad didn't have to push me as
much because I was the more obedient ones.
Speaker 6 (15:39):
So I didn't even see it at all that way.
And then they're putting it out there on the.
Speaker 7 (15:44):
On the show and I'm like, oh, yeah, I guess
it kind of looks like he's pushing us, you know,
you know what I mean, Like because I was more
of the subservient loans that would just do it, you know,
and that didn't feel like pushing to me.
Speaker 6 (15:56):
I was just supposed to do what I was supposed
to and that's.
Speaker 7 (15:59):
And a lot of people these days see it and
they're like, not pushing my kids because there was you know,
I mean, how do He had to overcome that too,
because it was kind of punishing to her personality, which was,
why are you trying to make me be something I'm not?
Speaker 6 (16:13):
And that's the.
Speaker 7 (16:14):
Big underlying theme that a lot of people won't read
into it, especially youth, is like twins always get treated
as their one person and not two totally different personalities
even though you look like on the outside, and that
I think we were. That was portrayed well with the fighting,
because we fought and fought and fought to try to,
you know, be individual.
Speaker 4 (16:34):
Be your own person.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
Yeah, I have twin nephews and my sister from day one,
we and to be honest, like it wasn't on purpose
or anything, but we would use.
Speaker 4 (16:45):
Them or they a lot.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
And my sister was so adamant, no, it's good Hunter
and it's Coulton.
Speaker 4 (16:53):
It is not them, It is not you know she she.
Speaker 3 (16:55):
Has always made it such a big deal and at
first it was kind of like, I'm just I mean,
I'm just talking about both of them at the same time.
That's so that's why I'm using them and they and
but now with both of their personalities, they are two
totally different kids into totally different things. And I'm so
glad that she, you know, really advocated for them, because
(17:15):
you see that and hear about that with twins quite
a bit, you know, wanting to be seen as their
own person, not not the same, you.
Speaker 7 (17:22):
Know, and they coaches can see it in certain ways,
but people don't. They don't even realize they're doing it,
like they those twins, they do this, they do that.
Speaker 6 (17:34):
I'm like, what you know, Wait, yeah.
Speaker 7 (17:37):
I.
Speaker 4 (17:40):
See, I'm the opposite. I have prayed so hard my
whole life to be a twin, and.
Speaker 3 (17:44):
Then when I became, when I told her kids, all
I wanted was twins. I wanted so bad my dream.
Speaker 4 (17:52):
What a.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
Twins run in my family too, So I was very
really prayed.
Speaker 1 (18:00):
For it, and I wanted a twins.
Speaker 4 (18:04):
I never was a toWin and I never got them.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Dang it. Were you able to visit the set at
all as they were shooting?
Speaker 6 (18:17):
No, no, they filed in Salt Lake City.
Speaker 5 (18:19):
They did ask us to be in that last scene
where they throw up the WNBA ball in the game
and we're going against each other, which never happened because
I got injured. I got injured with a pretty bad
back injury in ninety nine and had to be released
for Greham. And Heather just got into the league what
in two thousand, two thousand, so she literally we would
(18:42):
have played against each.
Speaker 6 (18:42):
Other that season. It's so ironic.
Speaker 7 (18:45):
It's so ironic that we were prosed for eight years
and never once played a professional game against each other.
Speaker 6 (18:51):
Even they had to make it, you know, yeah, even.
Speaker 7 (18:54):
The same town in France. We were both hurt when
we had to play each other.
Speaker 6 (18:59):
And then the WNBA, whenever she was in, I was out.
It was weird. And then I was just finishing up
May thirty first, and.
Speaker 7 (19:08):
They were gonna do that last scene June second or something,
and I just couldn't fly back from France fast enough.
Speaker 6 (19:15):
She was overseas. Yeah, that's what it was. So they
wouldn't wait, they wouldn't.
Speaker 4 (19:18):
Wait for like, yeah, seriously, that would have been so epic.
Speaker 7 (19:25):
Way better, you know, like just even put us in
a gym anywhere. I'll fly to Houston and just.
Speaker 6 (19:30):
Throw up the ball, you know. Yeah, yeah, that's the
way it to work.
Speaker 5 (19:33):
You know, whatever can I interject on the real quickly
about the last thing that you guys said and how
they were saying about personalities we you know, just to
reiterate what she said is we are on dientical on
the outside, very very black and just opposite on personality.
Speaker 6 (19:49):
And my dad was my dad, and I buck ted's
because we're.
Speaker 5 (19:52):
Both very hard, strong willed, hard headed, and back then,
if you remember it was eighties, it was early the eighties.
It was eighty five. We started high school. There was
no there wasn't even a circuit for volleyball. I was
really just going to choose do Olympic. I just wanted
to do it with a great coach and do a
great program and made me play some.
Speaker 6 (20:12):
Beach tournaments and that was it. And there was no WNBA.
Speaker 5 (20:15):
We didn't know much about scholarships, so I didn't ever
think about I surely didn't think about playing basketball in
college because I didn't like basketball.
Speaker 6 (20:23):
Right, and then he makes me play.
Speaker 5 (20:25):
But what I'm saying is I bucked him so bad,
but because I wasn't old enough. And I think the
best I think the best thing to remember is not
only the context that this was recreational.
Speaker 6 (20:37):
This was not a you're gonna be a pro. You
got to do it now, you know. And it wasn't that.
Speaker 5 (20:42):
And then the second thing was I use payback is
sweet because every day every I coach hundreds of kids
in Houston, Texas, and I say, father's no best, and
the dads are watching, going yeah.
Speaker 6 (20:58):
And I'm like, I was you. I told my dad
I don't want to try it.
Speaker 5 (21:02):
I don't even want to do it, and he's like, no,
You're doing it one season and that's it. And so
all the parents love it, and I get to kind
of use that as a you know, kids listen to wisdom,
right well.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
So, well, now you forced is the wrong word.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
You were told that maybe it would be best if
you played a season.
Speaker 5 (21:19):
No, no, no, no, Larry Birch didn't didn't like tell
you it was best.
Speaker 6 (21:23):
You're doing it?
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Okay?
Speaker 6 (21:26):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (21:27):
How long did it take after you stepped on the
court for you to find a love for it on
your own?
Speaker 5 (21:32):
That's a great question. You know how I told you,
I'm very stubborn and strong willed. Oh, I was going
to make sure my dad was miserable for the first
few days.
Speaker 6 (21:40):
I was going to come home and stall.
Speaker 5 (21:44):
And make sure I hated him. I hate you. If
he's watching television, I hate you. I was so bad
and I'm helpful attest to it. But I remember the
turning point. I was starting.
Speaker 6 (21:57):
You have to sweat so much in basketball. That was
the funniest thing.
Speaker 5 (22:00):
Volleyball you stand still a lot in his calfs ring.
You don't really sweat outside. But in the gym, I
started sworting, like, I absolutely do not like this.
Speaker 6 (22:10):
And then after two.
Speaker 5 (22:12):
Weeks, it was two weeks, I was like, pee wee started.
Heather was doing really great at shooting free throw. She
was starting free throws and getting layups and I couldn't
do any of it. And I was like, mold be
durned if I'm gonna do it, just to feed her, right,
That was my first motivation after I met was mad
at my dad.
Speaker 6 (22:29):
Then I was like, gosh, basketball is kind of fun.
Then you go really fast and.
Speaker 5 (22:36):
It makes your brain work on all these levels of
like so different than volleyball. There's no net separating you
from the opponent and they can hit you while you shoot,
and it was like this whole dynamic that was it
was definitely after two weeks.
Speaker 4 (22:49):
Okay, so two weeks that's pretty quick though.
Speaker 7 (22:53):
I mean I literally, if you ask me what when
she liked it, I would have said when I got in,
I actually had pneumonia, not an ankle injury for our
queens in senior year, so I actually had to sit
out for two.
Speaker 6 (23:07):
Months right in the middle of the season.
Speaker 7 (23:09):
And I thought, literally, that's the when she started liking
it because she was wearing forty four points again.
Speaker 6 (23:16):
She just needed that time to shine all by herself.
Speaker 7 (23:19):
You know, if you would have asked me, I would
have swore, she said not for years, I had no
idea that much.
Speaker 6 (23:27):
Father have we never talked about this. I don't remember
ever talking about this. I remember lots of things.
Speaker 5 (23:33):
Let it be on the record. It was two weeks
because it was so fast and fun. I realized, Heather,
why would I play it because all the way to
senior year.
Speaker 7 (23:44):
That didn't make me wanted to Because you wanted to
play nation, we got to go on the club team.
Speaker 6 (23:50):
Yeah, well, I stayed with it.
Speaker 5 (23:52):
After after two weeks there was a turning point and
I started being intrigued.
Speaker 6 (23:56):
By all the challenges, and I love challenges.
Speaker 5 (23:59):
If you tell me I can't make a layup, iile
show you.
Speaker 6 (24:02):
You know, that's how we both are. That's kind of
hard for We're both like that. So we do this
a lot.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
Oh man, So wait, okay, so the movie comes out.
Were you together when you saw it? Was there a premiere?
How did how did that work?
Speaker 6 (24:15):
Oh?
Speaker 7 (24:15):
I was in California and she was in Texas. It
was in two thousand and two, January two thousand and two.
Speaker 5 (24:21):
I remember January eighteenth, two thousand and two, and we called.
We were on the phone live with dad and mom.
I don't remember if my mom was on the phone.
It was the funniest what you guys said comes full circle.
Speaker 6 (24:34):
Yeah, yeah, they're minikey every show.
Speaker 5 (24:36):
Did you see that they've made every shot out?
Speaker 6 (24:42):
We looked like we did not make any shocks.
Speaker 7 (24:47):
We had so many rebounds because of bricks against the backward.
Just constantly throwing your phone and we would catch it
and we we launched it.
Speaker 6 (24:55):
It was so bad. We tell our kids that when
we're coaching, do not thing that that is real. It'll
never happen.
Speaker 7 (25:03):
You got to work at it, and that's oh yeah,
just keep working at it.
Speaker 6 (25:07):
You know.
Speaker 1 (25:07):
So, did did one of you have the special move?
Or was the special move totally made up.
Speaker 6 (25:11):
The weird traveling.
Speaker 3 (25:14):
That move was not special praveling.
Speaker 2 (25:21):
It has become I don't know if you're aware of this,
but it has become a meme on the internet. Is
considered the worst sports scene ever filmed.
Speaker 7 (25:28):
I know, I saw a guy doing one of those
commentaries on a reel or something, and I was laughing
because I'm like, what did they take a six year
old kid and say, here, make a move or something
like figure that one.
Speaker 4 (25:42):
Actually, it looks like it was pretty okay.
Speaker 3 (25:56):
So you guys are done the movies out now, you
guys have also had your career. At what point, because
when we did the review, the amount of especially young
women who said this was the movie that pushed me
to want to be in the WNBA, that wanted me
to even start playing basketball.
Speaker 4 (26:17):
At what point?
Speaker 3 (26:18):
How long did it take for you guys, Because you
had to have just someone after someone coming up to
you guys and saying like that DCOM was a turning
point for me, right, I mean, it was such an
inspirational movie for so many young women out there.
Speaker 6 (26:33):
Yeah, I mean it just it just took off.
Speaker 4 (26:36):
And was it like immediate or what it was for me?
Speaker 7 (26:41):
I don't know. I wasn't even in that crowd. Like
I wasn't coaching at that time.
Speaker 6 (26:45):
You know. It was funny.
Speaker 7 (26:47):
A lot of people know about it, even and not
out of basketball. So yes, I would run into all
the time. Oh they're the ones that made the Disney movie.
Oh my gosh, that was so good, you know. And
even now, these kids they weren't even born time teaching,
they weren't even born. But everybody knows this movie. They
I think ESPN, ESPN made a top three or not.
Speaker 6 (27:09):
ESPN was top three did like all star Disney movies.
And we were with the Super Bud and High School.
Speaker 7 (27:16):
Musical and they as a you know, like I was like, whoa,
they watch it that much that I guess the.
Speaker 6 (27:23):
Original number one original movie. And I was like, oh,
they really like kids really like this one.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
Well what did you What did your teammates think? I mean,
you were still playing when it came out, weren't you?
I mean did the teammates?
Speaker 6 (27:34):
No, we were done.
Speaker 1 (27:35):
Oh you were done by that time.
Speaker 7 (27:36):
Yeah, And she had been injured for she had been
out for a couple of years. So I was actually
just going back to school, you know, like trying to
figure out. I knew I was going to be a
teacher since like sixth grade, so I went back for
credential and stuff like that.
Speaker 5 (27:48):
Wow, I was coaching the Hoop School, which is what
I do in Houston, Texas, and it's been a really
great It's just been awesome to be able to share
the movie with the kids. So during summer camp, it's
like our whole tradition. Now on Friday, anybody who goes
to full day camp gets to watch the movie at lunch, and.
Speaker 6 (28:05):
We watch because you only get a forty five minute lunch, so.
Speaker 5 (28:08):
We watch half the movie on Thursday and half the
movie on Friday. But more than that, it's the fourteen
year olds that are they realize what you were saying.
It's like it's a changing point for them when they
see that I was stubborn and they're identifying with the
stubborn little thirteen or fourteen year old that thinks he
doesn't want to play and her dad made her and
(28:29):
father's no best And you just got it in your
face and you actually liked the movie. Jeez, you know,
because the endgame is you win, you know, the kid wins.
I win, And now I'm doing something I even tell
the kids, I'm here before you today coaching in a
sport that I didn't want to play, and I ended
up making a career out of it and got to
(28:50):
travel the world and play in the WNBA. The top
eighty players of the world were in ninety seven, ninety eight,
ninety nine the first three years. Then they add a
team and so Heather was part of that group too.
This has been an amazing journey, and it was because
my dad wouldn't put up with stubborn me.
Speaker 3 (29:10):
Right.
Speaker 1 (29:11):
How did your dad feel about the movie?
Speaker 6 (29:15):
And I think they liked it? He said it was
well done.
Speaker 5 (29:19):
Both of our parents liked it. My mom wasn't a
big well she was a big fan of being portrayed
by you.
Speaker 6 (29:28):
Phillips because of the old days of you know, other stuff.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
I can see that, yes, but and my mother, and.
Speaker 6 (29:35):
I don't think she did justice to my sweet, gracious mother.
But she did a great job.
Speaker 8 (29:39):
Try okay yo, who now questions, going back to your
to your professional days, who's the best player both of
you have ever played against?
Speaker 6 (29:56):
Good question?
Speaker 7 (29:58):
M M.
Speaker 6 (30:00):
We were so lucky to play with such great players.
Speaker 7 (30:03):
And yeah, Don Staley by far the one that just
got runner up team national championship. She's she is the
most selfless player ever in the and and as a
person too, she's and even like we were, she was
(30:24):
a sophomore, we came in and we dropped half the
passes because she she had grown up playing with guys
and her passes were like behind the back, and we
would just she lost it so many times with this,
but but never ever like was punishing towards us. She
could have been so rotten if she wanted to, and
yet she was so such an amazing strong player. She's
(30:50):
a four time Olympian.
Speaker 1 (30:51):
I was gonna say, she's a mainstay in the Olympia
and the Hall of.
Speaker 5 (30:55):
Famer in women's and the men's Naysmith Hall of Fame. Okay,
so does everyone know? I mean, I don't know if
the audience knows that Heather and I were honored to
play under We were with Don Staley at University of
Virginia for three years her sophomore, junior, and senior years,
and we went to three final fours. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
Amazing.
Speaker 6 (31:16):
Yeah, So I.
Speaker 5 (31:17):
Agree with Heather that Don Staley would be the highest
remarkable player on the basketball court as well as person
that you'd want to be influenced by because of what
Heather said.
Speaker 6 (31:30):
She brought everybody up.
Speaker 5 (31:32):
She was always you know, she would work so hard
and just lead by example, which you see from a
person like Caitlyn Clark nowadays, but you see a lot
more girls talking about it or doing things that are
more ego centric. Don was very She was surrendered to
winning at all costs, and that meant she knew it
(31:53):
meant team.
Speaker 6 (31:54):
It wasn't just her.
Speaker 5 (31:55):
She might score thirty points, but actually on that team,
we had so many good players.
Speaker 6 (32:00):
She might get twenty two because.
Speaker 5 (32:02):
Heather got twelve and I got eight and Tammy got
you know, we had so many great players scoring equal
amounts of points.
Speaker 6 (32:09):
And that was another great thing about her.
Speaker 5 (32:10):
She wasn't just like I'm gonna gun it and score
my forty and you all just wait for the ball.
Speaker 3 (32:15):
Right.
Speaker 6 (32:15):
That's why our team did so well because it was
really a team.
Speaker 7 (32:18):
Yeah, that was a really great dynasty there because of that.
Speaker 6 (32:22):
And yeah, she also coached at Temple. She went back
to her roots, which she was from Philly.
Speaker 7 (32:29):
Coached at Temple, did well, but then got that South
Carolina job and then won three national championship championship.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
Yeah, they were Yukon before Yukon. Yes, that's right, yeah.
Speaker 7 (32:39):
Yes, And you know what, she the first one she
won because we literally lost every national championship. We made
it to the final game once, we made it to
the final four three times, we never won. We never
beat Stanford, we never beat Tennessee to go to it anyway.
So the first win her national championship, she made a
(33:00):
replica of each of the trophies with a plaque to
each of her teammates from those ones that lost, and
wrote once what is denied, delayed but not denied, delayed
but not denied, what is delayed is not denied.
Speaker 6 (33:18):
And then she literally sent us each totally unannounced.
Speaker 7 (33:21):
We got this passage and it's an NCAA Fund the
Championship trophy with our name.
Speaker 6 (33:27):
And I was like, she is so unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
Yeah, that was really cool.
Speaker 4 (33:32):
So rad, Oh my gosh.
Speaker 5 (33:35):
Yeah, she's that kind of person. You read more matter
in the in the news and things you'll see lately.
She's just bought a car for a janitor that didn't
have wheels. She gave a girl a nine hundred dollars
tip at the Bethay restaurant because she could tell the
girls struggling, you know, just because she's that and you
know she's never had money. If you knew where she
came from, she was from the projects in Philly. Ye,
(33:57):
she got a degree through basketball, She got a degree
at the University of Virginia. Has become and has become
one of the best coaches because and we have to say,
all of us have to know, just remind everybody that
we we are products of amazing coaches. Yes, and Down
is clearly a product of Debbie Ryan and all the
other coaches that have made her who she is on
(34:19):
the court. And now she's winning, winning championships and winning
going to the final four final game again this year.
Speaker 2 (34:24):
Yeah, I have to say, so, both my parents went
to Yukon and it was it was my mom was
the one who taught there's three boys, but she my
mom played basketball in high school, so she's the one
who taught us how to play basketball. And so Yukon
Basketball Toss was always the women's team.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
So we've been we've.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
Been following Yukon basketball for my basically my entire life.
Speaker 6 (34:44):
So well, Gino was Debbie's assistance assistant.
Speaker 7 (34:48):
Yeah, before week came there and and Tanya Cordoza, another
player that was on those dynasty teams, is his assistant to.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
This Day's amazing that she was from like.
Speaker 6 (34:59):
New jer is he or something.
Speaker 7 (35:00):
A lot of the coaches from New Jersey on our
staff on our team. But it's just like we did
have like a.
Speaker 6 (35:06):
Family unit there and w was like the mom, you know, she.
Speaker 7 (35:10):
Took care of us like her kids, and we had
a different you know, nowadays with Nil and everything, you
miss out on building that dynasty over a four year
period because anything can change, right, Yeah, But it's just
like don is Don's still the same today as she
was the first day we met her.
Speaker 6 (35:31):
And I like, she came here to La to play UCLA.
Speaker 7 (35:34):
In November which was our birth our birthday, and I
went up to the game and gave her a big
hug and she sat there and talked to me and
my my third son, and it was like, this is
so cool.
Speaker 6 (35:44):
You know, she's going to be anyone different. She's down,
you know.
Speaker 2 (35:48):
Yeah. Are you happy with the direction of the w
NBA specifically has been taking lately.
Speaker 6 (35:55):
Yeah, somewhat in regards to which which do you mean, Well.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
There's certainly there's certainly more publicity around the w NBA
than there has been for a while. Some people would
argue it's not all good, it's negative. Yeah, that's so yeah.
I mean it's in the zeitgeist, but maybe not necessarily
for the right reasons.
Speaker 5 (36:14):
Well we have that would be a long discussion that
we don't have time for.
Speaker 6 (36:18):
But no ex kidding, But I think my.
Speaker 5 (36:22):
My thing is, uh, you know, what wins is humility,
and you don't see a lot of humility right now,
and what wins is Clayton Kaitlin Cloark has humility still
and I don't know if she will be changed. You know,
she's early in the league and we I've known people,
right if you know people have been from zero to famous,
they it changes them. Sure, I think your biggest plight
(36:44):
as that person that's getting into stardom or fame or
money is that.
Speaker 6 (36:49):
You don't lose who you are.
Speaker 5 (36:51):
And I think and so you know, in their defense
people it's weighs them. So I'm not I don't want
to be judgmental, but I'm also you reckon it for
what it is, sure, And I do think humility just
attracts And we would love to see more of that
going on, right.
Speaker 6 (37:09):
And I watched the draft. I watched the WNBA.
Speaker 7 (37:12):
Draft and you know, it was good, it was exciting.
It's so it's so different, you know, than thirty years ago.
I can't believe I'm saying thirty years ago. You know
that it started almost thirty years ago. That's hard to
even fathom that we're that old. But it's nice that
there's so many opportunities. It's really nice for the girls
(37:33):
that there's so much to look forward to where, you know,
But at the same time, with the nil and everything else,
it's just a little I think, I don't know, I
feel like too much focused on money and rather than
the love of the game.
Speaker 6 (37:47):
So that's just my thinking.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
By the way, pagebackers number one, the number one draft.
So very very very excited.
Speaker 6 (37:53):
It's awesome.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
She's phenomenal. She really is awesome.
Speaker 7 (37:56):
And from Texas TCU, Oh, Tidy, you sent me her
he reels the one about.
Speaker 6 (38:04):
From TCU, How do you live in Texas?
Speaker 2 (38:06):
You can't.
Speaker 6 (38:07):
I can't remember the name, Heather.
Speaker 5 (38:09):
I know what you're saying, Yes, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 7 (38:14):
Yeah, I mean there's a lot of opportunities and international players,
you know, it was so different back when we were
When we first went over in ninety three, they were
only allowed two foreigners per team. So every country team
was like a high school team in some respects if
they were middle ground and then they got they paid
players like us to come over and make their teams.
(38:35):
Then a couple of years into it, it was Bosman rule,
where if anyone in Europe could just be floating around
and be considered not a foreigner. So we had no
French people on my number two team, Like starting lineup,
it was.
Speaker 6 (38:50):
Belgian, you know, English. It was weird. It was weird.
Speaker 7 (38:53):
But so yeah, so now there are a lot of
foreigners are coming here, which is good, you know.
Speaker 6 (38:58):
Yeah, strengths the world's amazing.
Speaker 2 (39:00):
Well, okay, last question, we're twenty years later. What do
you think the legacy of double teamed is going to be.
Speaker 5 (39:11):
Well, that's that's something you got to think about.
Speaker 6 (39:14):
Yeah, you want how do you want to say it?
Or you want to say what you do? You can
go first, we'll each have our answer. I think the
legacy of dreaming big.
Speaker 7 (39:25):
And going for setting goals high and going for it
no matter what, not allowing prior knowledge or anything, just
to get in your way, not allowing doubt or those
type of things, and just setting gold and going for
them the dream of, you know, finish doing something great
(39:48):
that a young person can have even.
Speaker 6 (39:51):
If they've never played before.
Speaker 7 (39:53):
And I also see the under the theme that had
he was talking about about listening to your parents, you know,
listen to your dad. You know, the father knows best
type of thing, don't I don't see that being as
big as the other one. Like I tell the kids
who the kids don't dream now, it's like said, go
(40:14):
for everything, give it, don't hold back, you know, And
so that would be what I would say. If you
know people are watching it twenty years from now, I'm
hoping they're seeing that.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
Yeah, that's great.
Speaker 5 (40:26):
I like the central theme to me was father knows
fathers know best because and you have to remember what
Heather just said didn't apply to me.
Speaker 6 (40:33):
I wasn't dreaming about being a basketball player. And there
I was.
Speaker 5 (40:37):
They're approaching me when I'm twenty seven years old. They're
approaching me about making a movie about a girl basketball player.
And I didn't even want.
Speaker 4 (40:43):
To be one.
Speaker 6 (40:44):
So that was right, I mean, isn't that funny? And
then the other thing. I like, they showed how the
rich it was. To me, it was we moved up
from Ridondo Beach.
Speaker 5 (40:58):
Ridondo Beach is not a it's a middle class whatever,
you know, neighborhood. Whereas we went up to Palace Verdes,
which was an affluent area, right, and they had these kids.
We were living in some sandy shores, right, So we
were in the ghetto of pollis urge, which there is
none and we didn't live in the sandy stores. We
(41:20):
lived in you know, we lived in a very nice
condominium complex, but we did live in a smaller, you
know place, and we were sort of the underdogs because
we didn't have the money that this one kid, Nikki,
remember in the movie, you see these rich kids, and
then she all she wanted. She didn't want that money.
She just wanted her dad to come to a game.
And that, to me, that is that's really great for
(41:43):
kids to see because they all are sidetracked right now
with I just want to be rich because rich people
have it made.
Speaker 6 (41:51):
Well, she didn't have it made. And guess what, at
the end, she ended up.
Speaker 5 (41:55):
Coming to our lame apartment for a lame sandwich that
my dad made it or my mom made it.
Speaker 6 (42:00):
You remember it was the chili.
Speaker 5 (42:02):
Now you gotta hear this, the real truth on that
one chili, corn chip, cheese dog or whatever it was
smashed together in the in the.
Speaker 6 (42:10):
Grill form and grill thing.
Speaker 5 (42:12):
Our our actual sandwich that was very unique to our family.
Speaker 6 (42:17):
This is the.
Speaker 1 (42:19):
Yes, yes, yes.
Speaker 6 (42:22):
The document.
Speaker 5 (42:23):
By the way, all of this stuff is in the
document that I wrote years ago called fact v Fiction
about the Disney movie.
Speaker 6 (42:29):
And I'll give it to you if you want to
put in.
Speaker 5 (42:31):
The notes of these so so they're gonna get a
real sandwich. The real sandwich was the Bird family was.
Thank you to Mary Birge, our health food mother. She
would have wheat bread, peanut butter, and lettuce, no nothing else.
Speaker 7 (42:48):
That's it.
Speaker 6 (42:50):
Jelly had sugar, no sugar, no jelly because jelly makes
the peanut butter.
Speaker 5 (42:56):
No, no peanut butter makes the jelly stick to your
teeth and you get cavity.
Speaker 6 (43:00):
Yeah, yeah, that was my mom.
Speaker 1 (43:02):
Peter, are we talking? Is this iceberg lettuce? I can't
believe we've been asking this.
Speaker 6 (43:06):
This is green leafy lettuce. No, you have to have
the darker greens. They have more vitamins. Come on, Williams.
Speaker 7 (43:14):
Yes, that actually, Heidi and I make everyone laugh because
we still eat those today.
Speaker 1 (43:20):
I'm trying one.
Speaker 4 (43:21):
Literally, I honestly don't think it sounds awful.
Speaker 6 (43:25):
I think it just smotherney. Yeah, smother it, smother it
with honey, it's even better.
Speaker 4 (43:33):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (43:34):
So it's just called the birch.
Speaker 6 (43:35):
Yeah yeah, And.
Speaker 7 (43:41):
If it was, if it was up to my dad,
we'd be going to Tommy Burgers for chili burgers.
Speaker 6 (43:46):
Yeah, my dad.
Speaker 7 (43:47):
You all know Tommy Burgers. Yes, that would be his thing,
for sure.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
I'll take. I'll be honest, I'll take. I'll try the
other sandwich. I'll try a birge, but I'd rather have
the Tommy Burger over the over the birge, if I'm
honest with you. Oh, thank you both so much for
joining us. This was great and.
Speaker 2 (44:05):
Such a treat for us to actually get to talk
to the people the movie was about. We haven't had
a chance to do yet, so this is really really cool.
This is the this is the neatest thing ever. So
thank you so much. And uh yeah, well, you know,
come back and watch another movie with us. Sometimes we'll
do something nothing to do with anything else.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
You could just come and.
Speaker 4 (44:21):
Play yes.
Speaker 7 (44:29):
You guys, okay, bye bye man.
Speaker 1 (44:35):
That was cool.
Speaker 7 (44:36):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (44:37):
First of all, hearing them kind of go after each
other like siblings is the greatest thing ever.
Speaker 4 (44:43):
Oh man, twins.
Speaker 3 (44:45):
It's like because they also have that twin connection that
they are already expecting to call out the sentence that's
about to come out of their twins' mouth.
Speaker 1 (44:55):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 3 (44:55):
So they're instantly just like on it, like there's no
beats in between.
Speaker 4 (45:00):
They just like they Oh man, I love it.
Speaker 2 (45:03):
I can't wait to read the fact fact v fiction
thing because I can't wait to see what because I
love how they're like, all right, this was right, that's
not so right?
Speaker 1 (45:09):
This is right. Like little things like they had the
double bike. We were like, who rides around in a
double bike?
Speaker 7 (45:14):
I know.
Speaker 5 (45:16):
It.
Speaker 4 (45:16):
I can't even believe it.
Speaker 2 (45:18):
So this is this is why I said this was
my favorite dcom of all time.
Speaker 1 (45:22):
This is this is why I said it's Rina.
Speaker 2 (45:24):
We all know why I vote voted this as high
as I did, And it's such a.
Speaker 3 (45:28):
Great true they you just want to keep watching it,
and I'm like, we've already done it our episode, you
don't need to do it again.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
But that was really really great little bonus episode together that.
Speaker 3 (45:40):
They're both still coaching and still mentoring out there and
something that they clearly were huge just yea huge presence
in such a you know, just.
Speaker 2 (45:51):
They're also the og when you're there the first season
of the w NBA.
Speaker 1 (45:56):
I mean, you are the pioneer. You're making this happen,
which is just so cool.
Speaker 2 (46:00):
I would love to I think I could have done
another hour on just what they think of what's going
on in the league and what Oh, I know everything.
I'd love to hear opinions of people that know it
a lot better than I do, to hear you know.
Speaker 3 (46:11):
Everything, experienced it and are able to kind of see
through the different aspects of what's going on right now.
You know a lot of positivity, but you know a
lot of things to probably kind of bring focus to
as well.
Speaker 2 (46:24):
Yeah, that was really cool. Everybody, go try a bird sandwich.
Speaker 1 (46:28):
Do give that a shot.
Speaker 4 (46:29):
I think I really actually might do it.
Speaker 2 (46:31):
Which say wheat bread, peanut, butter, and lettuce, let us
and then covered it honey.
Speaker 6 (46:36):
Covered honey.
Speaker 5 (46:37):
What the hell?
Speaker 1 (46:38):
It sounds like.
Speaker 2 (46:39):
Something you eat at two o'clock in the morning when
you're stoned thank you so much for joining us on
this park Opper episode that was a ton of fun.
Speaker 1 (46:46):
And don't forget to join us over on our other feed,
where we find the good, the bad, the medium, the ones.
Speaker 2 (46:52):
We remember, the ones we don't remember, the ones we
talk about, the ones we don't talk about.
Speaker 1 (46:55):
We're watching all the d coms, but.
Speaker 2 (46:57):
We've got to start wrapping it up because we only
have seventeen thousand left, so we're on the way.
Speaker 1 (47:04):
Thanks everybody for joining us. We'll see you next time. Bye.
Hosts And Creators
Will Friedle
Sabrina Bryan
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