"Super Globetrotters, away!"

When the famed acrobatic basketball team, The Harlem Globetrotters, first made their Saturday morning debut in 1970, they faced their fare share of villains on and off the basketball court. But they lacked something that many of their cartoon cohorts took for granted – super powers. For their spin-off series, The Super Globetrotters, this lovable collection of athletes, just as adept at slapstick as they were with slam dunks, finally got to be superheroes.

Debuting in 1979 on NBC, this second Hanna-Barbera series based on the famed basketball team found the players with some new formidable talents. Thanks to their magical portable lockers, they were able to secretly transform into able superheroes, each with their own individual abilities as well as the collective capability of flying. They received their missions from the Crimeglobe satellite and each show generally revolved around them losing a basketball game (as civilians) to some sinister collection of dribbling adversaries in the first half, then calling upon their super powers to defeat their foes in the second half.

Noticeably absent from the Globetrotter lineup was superstar Meadowlark Lemon. This time around, the group was led by veteran Curly O’Neil (and his alter-ego, Sphere Man.) Alongside were Nate Branch (Fluid Man, voiced by Scatman Crothers,) Twiggy Sanders (Spaghetti Man,) Sweet Lou Dunbar (Gizmo Man, who possessed perhaps the most formidable Afro ever to be witnessed on a Saturday morning cartoon) and Geese Ausbie (Multi Man.)

After two months and 13 episodes of battling athletic adversaries, the group enlisted the help of their giant lizard friend Godzilla and the name of the show was changed to The Godzilla/Globetrotters Adventure Hour.