Yesterday, September 1, we played our first game in the gym with fans and spectators watching. The scrimmage was against a team from the Polish 2nd Division, also known as the I Liga. The guys on my team knew most of the opposing players and things were very light before the game started.
The three Americans, Anthony, Jalen, and myself did not start because the coach wanted to build the anticipation for the crowd. We are the first Americans to be on the team in fifteen years and everyone is quite excited. When we entered the game the crowd roared in excitement and Anthony quickly made a nice move by splitting a pick and roll drawing ooh’s and ahhh’s from the crowd. I did much better this game with 18 points and close to 10 rebounds, but there is always room for improvement. Jalen did well by being a Swiss army knife on the defensive end switching every screen and rebounding out of his area.
After the game we took a myriad of pictures with fans who’s kids were amazed by the play of the team. For many of those young kids especially the ones younger than 14 this is probably their first time seeing a black person before and they were unhesitant to ask for pictures and autographs. All in all European basketball so far has not been easy by any means but it has been extremely fun. It’s also been extremely loud as fans bring anything they can into the stadium to make noise for their favorite players and team. This includes large drums, airhorns, pots, pans, and anything else they can use to keep the stadium at a deafening decibel.
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