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| Tweet Topic Started: Aug 22 2007, 10:53 PM (632 Views) | |
| Bada Bing | Aug 22 2007, 10:53 PM Post #1 |
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El Crack
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09 JULY OFF SEASON JUST NOT MAGIC So, here's the first entry in this blog. Obviously it's going to get updated more frequently once the domestic season starts, as I'll be focusing primarily on my team, Manchester Magic, who play in the EBL Division One. I go to most games, home and away, and I hope this blog is not just going to be about the games themselves, but the experiences and what motivates someone to spend regularly spend 8 hours of their Saturdays on a bus, just to watch a semi-pro basketball game. Or, more accurately, how they wouldn't want to be anywhere else! The off-season for British basketball fans is long and gruelling, lasting about six months. Sure, there's the NBA finals, but that doesn't really grab me every year, and even when it does, it's hardly the same as going to the Magic at the weekend, debriefing after the game and then starting to look forward to the next game . We are quite lucky this summer in that we have the GB programme to look forward to but 'the season' won't really have begun for me until I'm sat in the Amaechi Centre on October 6th watching Magic take on Bristol. Last season was the most successful in the senior Men's side's history, but I really think this year we can do better. The Manchester Evening News reported last week that we could be (re)signing Steven Gayle and Delme Herriman, plus a new American 3 man who Jeff has been after since last summer, plus a Euro big man (I have some small idea who this might be, but I'm probably wrong) plus maybe one of the two imports from last year - I mean come ON! That side - (new guard), Cags/Miller, Gayle, (new Yank), Herriman, Thomson + last year's bench (I mean Matt Hogarth, possibly not even starting!) that side would be VERY, very competitive in D1. I know this paragraph contains a lot of IFs... IF Al Gore had a soul, he wouldn't be a vampire; IF Phil Collins had hair he wouldn't be bald. But that team would be competitive in the BBL, let alone our 'lowly' division. Colour me very, very excited about the new season. Just wish it would hurry up! More comment when we have more news... 10 JULY BISH BASH BOSCH So, given that I've joined in bada's little bout of Euro-fanboy one-upmanship, I thought I'd take some time to point out that I should clearly win it all by a mile: It all started with the scarf... I knew I should have bought an Eiffeltowers scarf when I had the chance! However, I didn't have the money, after forgetting to go to a cashpoint in Amsterdam before leaving and being in a rush to get to the Maasportshaal when I got off the train, I was left a bit short in the cash department, especially after a taxi I'd figured would cost 15 euros tops ended up closer to 30 (I think the firm was called De Robbenbarjstaardkars or something). After buying my ticket I didn't even have enough left for a scarf (the only merch they had left). At the end of the game, which went to OT, I realised there wasn't a phone to be seen in the place, no payphone, the office and bar had shut, and anyway I'd managed to lose the taxi number I'd been given by my driver on the way in. So, on my own, standing outside an Arena a good few miles away from a town in the relative middle of nowhere in central Holland. After a bit of pacing around, I figured I'd try to find a bus stop, so I started off down the main road in the direction of 'Centrum'. I found the bus stop about 2.8 seconds after what turned out to be the last bus back to the town sped by. ####. Ah well, maybe the taxi seemed to take ages because of the traffic or Hans van Rippoff took the long way round... I'll start walking. I knew the last train wasn't til gone midnight, so I wouldn't be stranded, no matter what happened. So I walked, and I walked a bit more, and then a lot more, always following that bloody 'Centrum' sign. Through leafy suburbs, nothing threatening, but half an hour turned into 45 minutes... and then an hour.... I started off being nonchalant, then worried, then it became hilarious, then back to pissing me off, then really funny as I contemplated the sheer absurdity of the situation, then about 90 minutes in my feet starting hurting, and although the signs kept guiding me, there was absolutely nothing to suggest I was approaching a more built up, more 'city' like environment. No bigger buildings, office blocks etc. Just mile upon mile of pleasant, dark, pretty cold Dutch suburbia. Just over 2 bloody hours of walking after I'd shuffled nervously out of the arena, the thrilling game seemed a long, long time ago. Once I'd actually reached the city, I started to panic as it wasn't obvious where to go for the station and time was ticking down... the thought of having to sleep in the square in front of the station (no 24 hour bars in this sleepy little hamlet) was becoming ever more persistent. When I turned the final corner and saw the large station building lit up at the end of the road, I don't think I've ever felt more triumphant and relieved - Ray Mears ain't got #$£! on me! I SURVIVED! Realising the time, I'd been running for about the past 5 minutes, or as close to running as my aching body would allow. I sprinted up the escalator and stumbled through the open doors of the last train back to Amsterdam. |
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EuroLeague Women because women's basketball is the most important thing in life after family and good health! | |
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| Bada Bing | Nov 7 2007, 06:08 PM Post #2 |
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El Crack
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23 AUG WHEN LESS IS MORE The long, arid summer (OK, it's been leathering it down since May, but I'm being fruity here) without basketball was put to rest last night in Birmingham as our brave boys in blue sent those shifty Slovaks packing. Or, if you don't read the Daily Mail, as GB defeated a hard-working but ultimately over-matched Slovakia team by 77-52. The game was a good one, as good as 25 point laughers can be. Deng had a shaky start but didn't take long to take over the game on the defensive boards and get all his teammates involved when he needed to. It was a perfect demonstration of the best player on the floor not playing just for himself, but for his team. The mutual appreciation between him and the crowd was touching - it's clear that he's playing in a GB vest because he wants to, because he feels he needs to. He's an example to all the NBA players, and some of the Brits who pulled out, about taking pride in the jersey you play in, and the bigger meaning behind it all. Robert Archibald's display made me very happy that it's a GB team rather than just England, and there were plenty of other positives about the game. But it's not really the game itself that I want to write about - what I was really impressed by, and in a way it's a shame that I have to say it was a pleasant surprise, was everything else about the night's experience. I still think the FIBA observer might have had words with him for bigging up the GB players as they exited at substitutions, but I know how he would have been dying to break the old 'classics' and he didn't. So a gigantic 'thank you' to FIBA for that. The crowd was higher than I expected, around 3,500 which isn't great by European standards, but given that I genuinely expected around 1,000 souls scattered round the NIA, that too gave cause for smiles. I groan every time Mike Shaft is allowed anywhere near a basketball game with a mic in his hand, but the good old trusty FIBA regs ensured that Shaft was as damn near mute as he'll ever be. But the real kicker was the crowd seemed altogether very knowledgeable, in tune with proceedings, would probably have been louder had it not been such a blowout game, but the whole 'experience' for want of a better word, was made all the more enjoyable by the relative lack of anything TRYING to make it an experience - I would have been proud to take my football-snob mates who sneer at everything else to that game last night, and I think they would have enjoyed it. Sadly, this is a novel occurence in British basketball, but I hope that it's one that comes to be the norm over time. Away from internationals, things are beginning to pick up domestically - some signings announced amongst the EBL D1 big boys and no doubt more to come. Given the unknown status of most import players before they arrive, it's very hard to project a team's chances before the season, even a couple of games into the campaign, but I haven't heard anything to dissuade me from placing Magic as pre-season favourites. Worthing will be lucky to get two new guys as good as Ott and Ivanovskis; Reading have lost last season's impact player in Ryan Williams - who will probably average 30 a game this year but won't be able to get Bristol into the playoffs by himself - and Magic have already announced a theoretically good import in Patrick Dwyer and some very capable returnees from last year. Far too early to get a real handle on how things will go, but everyone in Manchester should be very excited about the coming year. |
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EuroLeague Women because women's basketball is the most important thing in life after family and good health! | |
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| Bada Bing | Nov 7 2007, 06:09 PM Post #3 |
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El Crack
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01 OCT MAGIC CHAMPIONS ELECT So, not much going on in the world of basketball for me to blog about, at least that I've been able to see, but I wanted to check in and remind everyone that this will be a busy partof badaball once the season hurries up and starts, and reading the BBL reports over the weekend has just made me want the D1 season to start even more. Some good progress has been made over the summer in Manchester, most notably in signing London kid Orlan Jackman - alongside Stefan Gill and Steven Gayle, that's three guys who are more athletic than any all-English trio in the BBL, and should dominate D1 this year. Watching the Magic warm up for the season in a narrow loss to Everton Tigers has given me a lot of optimism about the season to come, and the squad isn't even finished yet. In beating Worcester Wolves (for the second year in a row) and holding Sheffield Sharks to two narrow defeats along with the Everton game, the boys have shown that D1 might not be able to handle them this year. With the Red Sox cliniching the AL East crown, Stockport County getting off to a good start in League Two and the promise of great excitement and progress at the Amaechi Centre, my favourite time of year is just approaching - when the climax of the baseball season collides with the ratcheting up of the football season (both 'real football' and the NFL) and the beginning of our domestic hoops programme, with the leaves falling off the trees and the need for scarves and coats outside, hot drinks on the terraces, the run up to Christmas starting... it's enough to make me feel all warm inside from just thinking about it! So although this is a very small update on the column, it will be a lot more busy once the real hoops action starts in Manchester, and around the country, so don't sleep. Now, back to this Keeper League draft, I haven't checked in for about 20 minutes, I want to see who elseJez has fleeced. Until next time... |
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EuroLeague Women because women's basketball is the most important thing in life after family and good health! | |
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| Bada Bing | Nov 16 2007, 07:48 AM Post #4 |
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El Crack
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02 november chips with everything A few games into the season and our first look at the Magic team and some of its competitors, and a few things are becoming apparent. The process of shaping a team identity, of picking out the team leader, the go-to guys, the solid backups who give hustle and provide ‘glue’, the real esprit du corps, that can only develop naturally, and it will take a few weeks before it reveals itself. It’s a situation a lot of British basketball teams, and I’d guess teams all over the world find themselves in at the beginning of each campaign, with so many new faces and player turnover so high, but the teams that end up winning the league hit the ground running, they just fit together like a jigsaw puzzle. I’m glad the EBL season kicks off with Trophy Pool games – it gives sides competitive fixtures that they can use to iron out the kinks and go into the league programme with a real flourish. At the moment, I’m not convinced this Magic side has a real ‘identity’ compared with some of its predecessors. But I’m sure that will come over time. As fans, we have to be patient and trust that the people in charge, who have forgotten far more about the game than we’ll ever know, will make the right choices, and I’m sure Coach Jones is on top of everything. So far to date Magic have played Bristol, Derby, Reading and Coventry in the Trophy pool and lost only to Rockets, in a game where we looked unstoppable in the first half and unwatchable in the second. But have we as fans become complacent, expecting big wins where we had no right – is it OK to be disappointed with beating Coventry by ‘only’ 14 points? Even though three of their players scored all but three of their 73 points?! Should we be beating Bristol by more than five? I don’t know… a win is a win, but there wins and there are wins – it make sense to me, anyway! On paper, this is the deepest and best side in the league, but it’s almost a cliché to point out the cliché – the game isn’t played on paper. It’s played mostly on wood covered concrete at municipal leisure centres, so let’s hope we prove to be the best side on that surface as well. At this stage, I know Reading will probably be just as good as last year if they get a decent replacement for Clint Deas and Magic will really miss Stefan Gill for the 6 weeks he’s in Denmark. It just remains to be seen how Worthing look, without any real close games so far to tell. The big test of the Trophy pool was Reading and it’ll be even more of a crunch game on November 24th when we entertain them in the League. Meanwhile Magic head off to Taunton for the first time ever to take on the Tigers. It’s a long trip, and it’s a shame I won’t be making it. Other commitments this season might mean I don’t get to as many games as I would like, but I’m not missing trips to Worthing or Reading for anything. I expect Magic to come away with the victory – I don’t know much about the Tigers side, or if they have any paid professionals, if not they could find it hard to survive at this level. So far they’ve beaten a young non-import Leopards side and also shocked Sheffield, but then Arrows also lost to D3 Bradford in the Cup last week, so I’m not sure how much of a shock that really is. But their website looks professional and they seem to have a modern facility, so they’re already ahead of some D1 teams in that regard! I wish them the best of luck for the season, in all but two games, obviously. No matter what happens, the league promises to be close again this year, and I’m glad it’s all tipping off for real this weekend. Check back soon for more thoughts on the early season and whether or not Steve Boonham has hit any more threes. |
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EuroLeague Women because women's basketball is the most important thing in life after family and good health! | |
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| Bada Bing | Nov 16 2007, 07:49 AM Post #5 |
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El Crack
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07 nov FEELING THE HEAT Thanks to a Bosnian poster on Whatsbev kindly uploading the domestic TV coverage from last night’s game onto the web, I was able to see the first half of Guildford’s first expedition into the jungle of European hoops and although I wish them the best in their endeavours and think it’s brilliant that they’ve even been able to get this far, I do fear for their credibility if last night’s game against KK Bosna in Sarajevo. They went behind by 18 in the first quarter, and really, that’s all she wrote. The problems in having an immobile centre in Carlton Aaron were evident from the start as he was easily beaten back down the floor by his opposite number Lance Williams who isn’t as big, but looked light years ahead in terms of athleticism and body control. Aaron might be able to muscle his way past some of the 6’8”, 6’9” centres in the BBL, but against guys just as tall and powerful but a lot more refined, he is going to struggle mightily in this competition. It was a nightmare showing, with zero rebounds and three fouls in only just under 20 minutes. Heat star point guard Brian Dux looked like had the speed to keep up with his counterpart, but got badly exposed on defense in the second quarter as Bryan Bailey just ran through him for 2 and the bonus. He had a couple of driving layup attempts swatted disdainfully in the opening stages which set the tone before Aaron’s struggles even began. Compared with the crisp ball movement of the Bosnians with Goran Ikonic curling, catching and snapping off three pointers seemingly before he’d even received the ball let Paul James’ men know what they’re up against. KK are a good side, but the Heat will face better – virtually every side in this competition has a centre as good as Williams and a guard as good as Ikonic – this is industry standard at this level! When Guildford went to a 2-3 zone early in the second, they gave up offensive boards, but did look like they were at least making Bosna think, but it was quickly abandoned. They might have to play a kind of assertive 2-3 or 3-2 sort of matchup zone in order to conserve energy and not chase quicker, better shooters through endless screens. Not for the whole game, but at least to give their opponents another look. What they did in the first quarter clearly didn’t work! So, that’s enough negativity, what about the positives? Well, Danny Gilbert ended up with 23 and shot the ball well from behind the arc. Dux wasn’t embarrassed. And…. I’m struggling. But that is only with the benefit of watching the first half! One thing that seemed obvious to me is that Heat are going to have to be much more patient on offense. They need to try and shorten the game – pass the ball, make good cuts, play as a team. There is no point trying to play one-on-one basketball. When Dux drives, even if he beats his man, he’s going to find a 6’8” guy sliding over to block that layup a lot more often than at home. If they get dribble penetration, they have to be intelligent enough to use it to find an open man, not jack up a wild shot. One or two passes then a shot with half the shot clock left means they’re only going to have to play defense more and more, and if they let European teams run down the floor off a miss before they get their D set, they’re going to pay big. Is this asking too much, to adjust this quickly? I fear it may be, but are definitely lessons that can be learned and mistakes that can be fixed. I hope for the Heat fans’ sake that they can do just that. The first half that I saw, and reading about the rest of the game, it kind of reminded me of a 1 vs 16 or 2 vs 15 NCAA Tournament game. Where the big dogs jump out to an early lead, then the Cinderella team hangs around, then does a bit more than hang around, but then ultimately, as most people know deep down, just doesn’t have the stamina or the skill to make it a close game. This was an 8 point game in the second half, but the accounts I’ve read really don’t make it seem like it was ever in doubt. If Guildford manage to be that #16 seed that hangs around in most of their games in this competition, well I think that on their budget and with their inexperience, then that should be counted as a success. To finish, I’d like to thank the poster known as Peppermint Park Ranger on whatsbev for uploading the footage, it was great. Best of luck for the rest of the tournament. |
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EuroLeague Women because women's basketball is the most important thing in life after family and good health! | |
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| Bada Bing | Dec 10 2007, 07:16 AM Post #6 |
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El Crack
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16 NOV EUROTRASH WITH THE SUPER DEN BOSCH Badaball Eurotrash ULEB Cup Report from ‘s-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands EIFFELTOWERS DEN BOSCH 101 – 94 HAPOEL JERUSALEM I should get in touch with the Eiffeltowers management and try to wangle some free tickets and travel to their next ULEB Cup home opener. Last season I see them pull off the shock of the competition by beating eventual champions Real Madrid in OT, then this week they spring a slightly less unexpected, but nonetheless eyebrow-raising W over Israeli giants Hapoel Tel Aviv. I’m their lucky charm! You could argue that last year’s exploits gave their returning players some vital experience and confidence to take on Europe’s best, and added to a much better crop of new players, that this victory was the result of patience, discipline and talent, but….. nah, it was all on me. Last season saw me embark on a Homerian adventure to get back to Amsterdam after the game – and if you think I’m referring to the Greek author of the Odyssey or Bart’s dad, you’d be right on both counts. This time I told myself, do some research, find out when the buses are… and it worked! Your intrepid correspondent managed to navigate via the 68 bus out to the wilds of Maaspoort, although when they invite me to every game, win them all, gaining entry to the Euroleague, winning that and earning millions of Euros along the way, I’m going to make them build an arena a bit closer to the town. This place is in the middle of nowhere! It’s a bit like the Triangle at Burgess Hill, except much bigger. But it has the same ‘take a wrong turn, end up in a farmer’s field’ location. The moral of the story is – I need to learn to drive. But enough about that – what about the game? Well, I learned reading the Jerusalem Post online that last weekend there was a shocking incident in the game between Jerusalem and Hapoel Holon in which a firecracker was throw towards the floor, exploding and leaving a security guard missing three fingers. A lot of writers on this site, myself included, are continually praising continental (erm, yeah I guess Israel counts for these purposes) crowds for their passion for their team and wishing it could be more like that over here. I’ll always argue that, but I suppose this is the darker side of that “ultra” fan culture. And in Israel, hearing explosions in public places like a basketball game, no matter how ‘small’ they are, is bound to cause immediate turmoil, even if, thankfully, there were no fatalities. The JPost game report suggests that the Hapoel players were still affected by the incident in this game, but I think that’s a copout. While it was obvious to anyone present that their players were, on the whole, more talented and athletic than their opponents, they didn’t get the most of their abilities, whilst Randy Weil’s men played to the absolute peak of their talent, and that’s why they won. This was a triumph for pragmatic basketball, and that’s not to say that it was boring, on the contrary, it was fantastic to witness a team with a gameplan, executing it almost perfectly and with the utmost precision. The game itself was packed with action – in the first quarter there were two successfully converted 4-point plays, and a bizarre incident where a Hapoel player’s second free throw was disallowed for overstepping the stripe. Except that should really be “stripe” because there wasn’t one! Well, sort of. The circle at the top of the key was filled in with the Dutch team’s sponsor’s logo – EIFFEL. The second F in EIFFEL actually also doubled as the free throw line, except it didn’t go all the way out to the perimeter of the circle. Travis ‘Forever’ Young was sent to the line at the other end almost immediately and checked with the refs exactly where he was supposed to stand – although with it being his second year with the team, one might assume he should know by now! The crowd was fairly quiet at this point so it was possible to hear Hapoel’s Tim Bowers say to the ref that this was “ridiculous” and he’s “never seen anything like it!” Although with rumours abounding that Plymouth’s whole court is actually too small, he hasn’t seen anything nearly as ridiculous as if he played in England! Hapoel boasted two players who I recognised as ‘names’ – forward Marcus Slaughter, once of San Diego State and briefly Miami Heat, and former Iowa State standout and Detroit Pistons reserve Will Blalock. Slaughter began strongly, evidently too quick and athletic to be guarded or troubled on the defensive end by his opposite number Brandon Kurtz. The game proved to be a nightmare for Kurtz, who could have been forgiven for sitting in darkness muttering ‘the horror….’ after missing all six shots, committing a dumb off-the-ball foul right at the shot clock buzzer in crunch time and then throwing the resulting inbounds pass straight out of bounds, but luckily his team-mates picked him up. Slaughter signed a two year deal with the Heat this summer and looked like a guy who really didn’t want to be back in Europe as he faded badly after a good start. Hapoel were led by Guy Pnini, a deadly outside shooter who drained three treys, shot 5/7 from closer in on the way to 23 points. His shooting and leadership dragged the Israelis back into the game after giving up a 15-2 run in the second quarter to trail 51-46 at halftime. There was also drama at halftime which was imperceptible to the human eye, but must have worked as someone rewound the space-time continuum back to 1999.To begin the second period the shot-clock had noticed this trip back into history, decided it should count down from 30 seconds and it took more than 5 minutes frenzied arm waving at the scorers table to convince it to go back to 24! Eiffeltowers played a basic flex/motion offense in the first half, with plenty of down screens and baseline jumpers, and nobody benefited from this more than homegrown star Kees Akerboom. He came off the bench to score 21 points on 6/9 shooting and a perfect 5 from the line, and was a model of efficiency, absolutely automatic from 18/19 feet and Hapoel had no answer. Once the Israeli team tired and the game was winding to its conclusion, the system opened up to allow Travis Young and backup point guard Roye Berkowitz to create off the dribble, which the former especially did to devastating effect. Young scored 31 points and was a force all over the court, picking Blalock’s pockets on more than one occasion and shooting 57%. He was part of Den Bosch’s Dutch championship winning team last year and it was noticeable that he and reserve forward Robert Owens, the other American returnee, got by far the loudest cheer during the player intros. The changes made in the off-season by Coach Wiel seem to have paid off handsomely. New imports Jayson Wells and Darrel Tucker were both superb, and looked like an upgrade over Erik Nelson and Leon Rodgers. Tucker in particular did a magnificent job off the bench with 20 points of his own. Another bench player, Roye Berkowitz came in to spell inconsistent starter Dean Oliver and bagged 12 points and 5 assists in 21 minutes. The fact that Eiffeltowers only committed 6 turnovers through the entire game demonstrates just how efficiently they ran their offense and how little was wasted. This was a textbook demonstration of how to win a basketball game. Give me this brand of basketball any day over the one-on-one, attempted crossover then chuck up a shot in bad traffic selfish ballhog style so unfortunately prevalent in this country. It got me thinking – do we just not have the players to run a simple offense the way that Coach Wiel has his players do. Obviously their talent level is much higher to begin with – I would expect to see Travis Young on a Euroleague roster next season for one. Is there just not enough time for practice in the BBL? I don’t mean to use this as an attack on our domestic league, but as this was one of the few times I have seen a genuine high quality game in the flesh, the contrast was blatantly apparent. The crowd was odd – from memory, I think it was more or less the same as last season in number, if the arena holds 2,500 then there were probably 2,000 present. When they were loud, they were very, very loud, and the signature “We… are…. WE ARE DEN BOSCH!” chant is still resonating round my head, but there times when you could hear a pin drop, especially early on. They seemed to need to be prompted, by bench players waving towels and imploring them to make some noise, or by something dramatic on court. It was a weird dynamic, but the best part was before the game as the lights went out for the home player intros, everybody behind the basket at the home bench end lit up sparklers! It was a wonderful sight, and I couldn’t help but wonder if it would ever get past the Health and Safety fascists in this country…. A whole section at the Amaechi Centre or Thunder’s home court waving sparklers would be a sight to behold! But as the home team fought back from 74-74 at the third break to run away from the Israelis and take a deserved win, the roof was in danger of coming off; this isn’t a hotbed of European basketball like Greece or Spain, but they know their stuff, support their team in numbers that most BBL teams would kill for, and they fully deserve to see a team that can compete with some of the top teams in Europe. I think on this display, they can certainly do better than last year in the ULEB Cup, and nobody will particularly fancy coming to Maaspoort this year. I hope I can get back out there to cheer on my newfound second team (and make no mistake, in the second half I was out of my seat more than a few times!) as they go for more glory. Or maybe my dreams will come true and they’ll be drawn in a group with a BBL team and you can all see for yourselves. Until next time… we are, WE ARE DEN BOSCH! |
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EuroLeague Women because women's basketball is the most important thing in life after family and good health! | |
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| Bada Bing | Jan 20 2008, 08:13 PM Post #7 |
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El Crack
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18 NOV BITS N PIECES So, a few games into the NBA season, and I'm already following it more than in previous years, partly because I've discovered the nudge-nudge, wink-wink ways of using p2p internet streaming and partly because of joining my first fantasy keeper league. I think this year's season will be the best since the late 90s though, as Bill Simmons pointed out in his slightly retro-active Season Preview, there is a true depth of talent in the league this year, with no legitimately horrible teams and some of the most compelling potential stories. Of course the big one talked about over the summer has been the Celtics 'Big Three' and after seven games and seven wins, I'm even more convinced now that it was a masterstroke by Danny Ainge and could definitely lead the Celts back to the NBA finals. I'm backing them to win 56-59 games and I say that guessing that they may ease off the pedal with Allen and Garnett's mpg late on in the year. They play hard-nosed, team oriented basketball and with this astounding level of talent, that's going to be hard to stop come playoff time. I'm writing this whilst watching the Celtics play the Heat, and I don't know what it is, I just can't stand this Miami team. Wade just flat out annoys the hell out of me. I don't like his style, even though it's plain to see he is a superb player, there's just something about him that makes me think he's somehow... cheating is the wrong word, but he definitely plays like he's not playing fair somehow. It doesn’t help that the refs seem to have decided that palming the ball is OK when he does it, and he might as well wear shoulder pads if he’s going to be allowed to plow straight into defenders but still get the calls. I know it's mostly irrational, but there it is. Mourning has managed to fritter away a lot of the goodwill he earned by coming back from the kidney condition by whining his way out of Toronto and Pat Riley totally jibbed Jeff van Gundy but you know he’ll walk away as soon as the rebuilding process has to start. Which looking at Shaq these days, might be pretty soon. Another thing that's made my NBA experience much more fulfilling this year is the selection of excellent blogs I've started reading on the league. I've always preferred the FIBA rules brand of the game but one of the most compelling aspects of basketball in America is the cerebral, urbane, streetwise culture that has grown up and is reflected in the literature and ethos of hoops in cities like New York, DC, Philly and Los Angeles. To me, basketball is not hip-hop, basketball is jazz. Here's a small collection of what's making my NBA fandom way more fun this year: |
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EuroLeague Women because women's basketball is the most important thing in life after family and good health! | |
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| Bada Bing | Jan 20 2008, 08:14 PM Post #8 |
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El Crack
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10 DEC JUST MAGIC Before Magic's cup semi-final last night against Mansfield Stars (you might have heard of them, they feature The Best Player on the Face of the Earth, Rightful Heir to Jordan, Empress of India and Lord God Almighty, Rob Stockwell) I was thinking back to last year's semi final, where we defeated Reading and we all went on one of those celebrations most accurately described as "a mental" - we'd never made a final before, in Cup, Trophy or Playoffs, and to beat an arch-rival, and get to play on the big stage of the NIA, was easily the highpoint of the past few years at that point (of course, winning the Cup was even better). So, rewind back to last night, and we were up against a D3 side who, to be fair, had shocked three D1 sides to reach unknown territory for a club of their calibre. But to listen to some of their fans, the term "D1" can be applied across the board and Derby (before they had recruited properly), Bristol and Coventry (without the high quality domestic players to make up for only having one import allowed) were just the same as playing Magic, in our own backyard. I knew we should beat them by 30+, put simply there have been plenty of D1 teams with one good Yank, and not much else, and they've suffered hidings every year up against Magic, Worthing, Reading, the assortment of London teams and Plymouth and Teesside in days gone by. A certain message board was filled with posts that I'd hope for sanity's sake were subtly tongue-in-cheek about how Magic were going to cope with Stockwell, would they box and one him? (Answer: if we didn't do it for Alfredo Ott, it wasn't going to happen) How would they cope? What if they had to triple team him? Well, we won by nearly 40 (and it would have been 50+ if the bench hadn't played the last frame) and a large crowd with a lot of first-timers left having seen, well... not much of a game. It was a cakewalk. It was a walkover. It was how it should have been. And honestly, Leeds Met Carnegie were more balanced and dangerous opponents, two rounds before. The final buzzer went and it was a routine win, and without even the prospect of a trip out to an arena. I just hope that the East Midlands basketball community come out and support the finals day, because the thought of winning the cup in an anti-climactic place like Moorways (no offense, but its hardly the NIA) is a bit of a comedown. Hey, maybe some aggreived Mansfield people can come and cheer for Worthing, just make sure you're there! I'm sure on the day, everyone will be pumped up and excited and every Thunder and Magic fan will be living and dying with every possession, but could we please get the finals back together next year? It just doesn't seem right to do it like this. Obviously I'm delighted with getting to the final, but it's a little bit weird in that we haven't really beaten anyone good in order to get there. On a more positive note, the game I've been looking forward to since the schedules came out wil finally arrive next Saturday when Magic travel down to Worthing for our first encounter of the season. There's always a special needle in the atmosphere when these two sides meet, that grudge (always discussed in the bar in a friendly way, I might add!) that makes the game feel a little more meaningful, that it would make our weeks if our side won, that I love about sport and basketball in particular. I've never seen us win at Worthing but something tells me the way Steven Gayle is in the zone right now, with Boonham and Ogilvie giving us the size we lacked last year, and with Worthing losing Ivanovskis (for me, their best player last year) and Ott, the tide may be about to turn. Either way, I look forward to a few swift halves in the bar and to seeing what should be the game of the season to date. |
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8:51 AM Jul 11