Kristen Green, a former women’s basketball standout at UC Irvine, has been signed by the Orange County Gladiators of the American Basketball Assn. men’s professional league. The 5-foot-9 guard is scheduled to make her men’s pro debut Sunday at 5:15 p.m. against the San Diego Wildcats at JSerra High in San Juan Capistrano.

“Walking into a gym full of guys, I was nervous,” she said of her first scrimmage with the team. “But as soon as I started scoring a little bit, the rest of the team welcomed me and they really accepted me.”

On a side note: It really is a very, very small world. I was slightly aware of the ABA, being a women's basketball history nut. Notes the article, "in 1968, Penny Ann Early’s career with the Kentucky Colonels [a stunt ordered by the team owner] included inbounding the ball, before being replaced and never playing again."

The ABA recently floated back into my consciousness when Teresa Weatherspoon was named coach of the Westchester Phantoms. I smiled when her team faced the Vermont Frost Heaves (having lived in Vermont for four years I can appreciate the humor of the name) one of the top ABA teams.

So what happens this holiday season? I'm on the bus up to Boston and strike up a conversation with the gentleman next to me. A Connecticut track star back in the day, and currently a youth basketball coach, he was making his way north to watch his son play in the ABA. Their opponent? The Frost Heaves.