I was always impressed by the extreme love of
Canadian people for sports, all kind of sports.. and to prove my point, my three cousins
were willing to drive for almost 6 hours coming from Ottawa to watch an NBA
basketball game where The Raptors Toronto were playing against Hawks Atlanta in
Canada Centre, Downtown Toronto.
They got me a ticket as well, and I was very
excited to watch my first NBA game live, after growing up watching the glory of
Michael Jordan, Shaquille O’Neal and Magic Johnson on TV.
I’m not a basketball expert to talk about the
game, but all I can say it was a very tensed one, with the Hawks dominating the
first three quarters, and half of the fourth one too.. But the whole game
changed the last four minutes where The Raptors managed to change the equation,
and surprised their fans by winning the game, those fans who kept cheering and
pushing waiting for a miracle, that finally happened at the end.
Two of The Raptors players
did a fantastic job, Jonas Valanciunas (17), and Greivis Vasquez (21), and now
I’m curious to know more about the team and keep following their games.
I was fascinated by the entertainment aspect at
the game, where we stayed more than three hours, 48 minutes of basketball, and
the rest for the cheerleaders shows, the promotions and the different
entertainment activities to engage the fans and keep them full of energy..
which I felt they were super well done, and the synchronization between the
audio, and the visual on the screens and what’s happening on ground created a
great ambiance.
And of course, one of the highlights as well, was
the return of the Raptor mascot, who made a huge comeback after suffering a devastating achilles injury in
October, and he added the level of excitement between the fans who it seems
missed him a lot the last few months.
It was a very interesting
experience, seeing the support of the fans, of the real fans with their
unconditional support for their team and learning how to stay positive no
matter what cause things can always change and in this case the taste of
victory can be much sweeter.
