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Post by youngnixfan on Aug 21, 2018 7:05:24 GMT
Having read our friend IRF discuss his 1st outing at a basketball game in the London Lions thread I thought I would start another thread as Im interested on how others got an interest in the game.
In this incarnation Im like IRF it started about 4 and a half years ago, during the Coffino reign, when our son had a visit from some the Nix players to his school and he recieved a free ticket. hes not interested in sport so I didnt hold out much hope he will enjoy it and with me only knowing enough to get through a game I had to tell him what I knew to what was happening. He soon picked it up and loved it. Previously it started late 70's back up North like!
He trains with one of the junior teams hes not going to enjoy it as a career but enough to get him off his XBox!!!!!
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 21, 2018 7:21:32 GMT
It was a cold Sunday september morning in 1998 and my dad had just watched me score my 4th own goal of the season for Vospers U10s and he decided/realised I'd never be good at football. Raiders had a game so he decided to take me to see if I'd like it, I was hooked instantly, 20 years later and my whole family go to most games. Our children are now fans like we were.
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Post by blacknwhite on Aug 21, 2018 7:23:13 GMT
I have been into basketball since I was 8 years old, back when the Lakers were a force to be reckoned with, Shaq destroying the inside, and my Beloved Nets were still a sub par team (I chose them because I thought their Jerseys looked pretty cool and stuck ever since for some strange reason.
My first BBL game was on my 12th birthday, we got free tickets to see the Sheffield Sharks back when they played at the Arena.
Then since moving to Newcastle for Uni in 2011 I was brought to my first Eagles game by a friend who played for the Womens Team Northumbria Team, and I have been to every game since that I have been able to go to!
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Post by massiveridersfan on Aug 21, 2018 7:32:01 GMT
A friend suggested we went to see what was then newly promoted to the top division Riders (although they were probably called Planters or Walkers then) before going for a drink. I didn't even know there was a professional league before going. As soon as the game began I was hooked. After the second quarter I went to see Ursula Routledge and asked about season tickets. Although she hadn't got any then she promised to have some for the next game. Four of us bought them the following week and the rest is history. It's an addiction which has lasted for well over 30 years and one I don't want to break.
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Post by youngnixfan on Aug 21, 2018 8:44:03 GMT
Cheers Gonk or whoever it was, thats a better thread title.
Seems as though we are all in same boat you go to a game and get hooked straight away.
Most will have seen quite alot of changes.
Can see a Hersey blog coming along😉
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Post by interestedridersfan on Aug 21, 2018 9:11:21 GMT
Great thread.
Will add that it's the family atmosphere, the back and forth excitement and the accessibility of players to the kids that support them that made basketball stand out as a game we wanted to return to
(Plus the hot dogs back then!)
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Post by connors on Aug 21, 2018 9:56:46 GMT
Back in 1985 two good friends of mine had the luck to have a PE Teacher who played for a local team. They also had a school attached to a sports centre who were pursuaded to put on a Saturday morning session.
My mates literally dragged me along as I was tall and the London Youth games was rapidly approaching and they were short of players.......never looked back!!
Along with playing regularly what really helped get me hooked was the BBC still showing cup finals on Saturdays and the excellent (for the era) NBA highlights show they also had on late night.
I was lucky that some parents and a coach helped form a junior national league team and that the London Basketball Development officer ran weekly sessions out of Brunel Uni in parallel to our own efforts.
Sadly I just missed the short lived Brunel Ducks and the opportunity to watch live games in West London was limited for some time after that.
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Post by raiders92 on Aug 21, 2018 10:02:27 GMT
My mum got me free tickets through her work to go to the bbl Cup semi final, against MK lions I think raiders were like 20 down on aggregate going into the fourth, and I watched with a late bucket forcd overtime against demarious bolds I think, That got me hooked, the second game was watching Charles Smith score 40ish in the first half of the cup final that wasn't so great as a second game!! But then I started watching the nba specifically game 7 Boston Celtics vs The Heat and watching LeBron go off and watched him win that game six on his own, then watching the shot by ray Allen against the spurs in the finals with the famous BANG commentary, that compares to any great sporting moments I've ever seen
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Post by spaghettihoops on Aug 21, 2018 10:45:34 GMT
I had a slight interest as a kid in the 90s from watching the Saturday morning show on Channel 4 and playing NBA Jam on the Sega MegaDrive. This resurfaced by seeing some games in bars on holiday in America, and the excellent reboot of the NBA Jam game on the Wii. By sheer luck, I happened to search online for basketball on the very day tickets for the Hawks-Nets game at the O2 went on sale, and this became my first game in January 2014. I loved it, and looked up what else existed in the UK and have been going to watch the London Lions ever since. I'm sceptical about these things leading to a sustained interest and yet that's exactly how it happened for me!
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Post by interestedridersfan on Aug 21, 2018 10:51:05 GMT
Re the players giving tickets out at schools. It worked at our primary school near Loughborough. Plenty of kids started going to games and they also started playing basketball at school together. They actually won a game at riders which qualified them to play before the 02 playoff final!
But I also remember that the players returned the following year to the school and did a q and a with all the kids. By now there were lots of riders fans at the school (apologies as I've mentioned this before)
It was Barry lamble and harrison gamble who went back
I asked my son what questions the kids asked
And one was;
"How come you two never play for us!"
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 21, 2018 13:52:29 GMT
Cheers Gonk or whoever it was, thats a better thread title. Can see a Hersey blog coming along😉 Months ahead of you  daveballblog.wordpress.com/2017/06/14/ravings-of-a-madman/First game was a one point loss against Chester, ending a 13 game winning streak. While running a club is draining at times, basketball has given me some incredible opportunities and taken me to some places and events I'd never have seen. And Aston. |
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2NFR
Global Moderator 
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Favourite Team: Newcastle Eagles
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Post by 2NFR on Aug 21, 2018 16:43:42 GMT
Without sounding like some old git, I fell in love with the game as kid back in the 70's, mainly by watching The Harlem Globetrotters on a black and white TV. As for watching live - Sunderland in the mid 80's and early 90's as a side affect of watching live Ice Hockey in the same venue/leisure center. Then work/marriage/kids ... but did manage to watch a fair bit on terrestrial TV through the 90's, until it all went tits up. in the early 00's , the bairns were teens and played basketball in school/spare time and virtually begged me to take them to a live game, after a few years the kids discovered girls & booze and stopped going, but me and the misses were still hooked ... the rest is history  |
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shandy
Bench Player
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Post by shandy on Aug 21, 2018 16:49:03 GMT
Mate worked for a company that had corporate tickets for the metroradio arena went along with him and my son in 98. Been going ever since with my son. Will never forget the bbl trophy final at Brighton when we won our first trophy.
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Hector
Bench Player
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Post by Hector on Aug 21, 2018 16:59:36 GMT
Took an interest in the NBA when there were highlights on TV (cant remember which channel) when i was a kid but got involved with British Basketball when I started looking for other sports to follow after becoming disillusioned with Football and its obsession with money. Discovered that there were BBL teams in Guildford and Worthing and started watching both.
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Post by notoriousbigz on Aug 21, 2018 17:02:06 GMT
My choice of friends and being the school goalkeeper ultimately got me into basketball.
Mate of mine watched the then Chester Jets on a frequent basis and was a member of the school team - who were ultimately short for a school game one night. He suggested to the teachers that he'd ask, me being a dope agreed and it turns out being tall and able to judge the flight of a ball alongside an above average catching ability took me a fair way in the game domestically.
Naturally he suggested I go watch Chester one night so dragged the family - mum and dad both loved the family friendliness of it all and come the winter I decided to take a plunge into national league U18 after a successful trial at Sefton and after getting jumped at the age of 15 on an open age football pitch by a couple of "hard men" twice my age - kind of ruined the footy for me that one.
I'll slag the national governing body all day because I don't think they do things as well as they could, but one thing I will say is that the community is brilliant - I've met a lot of good people and the atmosphere is generally light hearted and I do feel privileged to have played and spectated at every level domestically.
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davetheglitz
Bench Player
Posts: 103 
Favourite Team: Plymouth Raiders
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Post by davetheglitz on Aug 21, 2018 17:58:04 GMT
As part of a business breakfast club I was given a free ticket for Raiders. I'd always assumed American sports relied on a body type to succeed and didn't have high expectations. HoweverI was blown away with the atmosphere, the speed of play and was so impressed with Josh Wilcher who certainly doesn't fit the body type I expected. I sponsored Raiders for a couple of years (now retired) and despite Corletto, White and Love's revolving door I'm still enjoying and have high hopes for this year - particularly with Josh Wilcher returning.
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Post by oldmanattheback on Aug 21, 2018 18:27:31 GMT
First game was a Guildford Pumas game after players visited sons school and got him interested. After they left had to wait till Heat moved to Guildford by then son had other interests but daughter was keen. Both have been keenly supporting ever since as a few people on here would no. A clue to who we are is that she plays a drum.😁
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Post by youngnixfan on Aug 22, 2018 8:57:44 GMT
Oh yes 2NFR the 'Lesch'as it was known to some back in the day. Mid 80's when Channel 4 got involved and had the 2nd half of a game on live on a Monday evening. There was some brill times had there and alot of terrific players.
Think we had more than 3 imports on the roster then.
Thanks guys for your memories and the day the sport got you
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Post by backtobasics on Aug 22, 2018 10:37:24 GMT
Liverpool's American point guard Leroy Shaw did a mini clinic at our school in 1980 and gave us free tickets to a game v Leeds. The game went to overtime and finished something like 101-100. How could I not go back? Astoundingly a very grainy copy of the game popped up on youtube a couple of years ago.
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vikkimoo
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Favourite Team: Sheffield Sharks
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Post by vikkimoo on Aug 22, 2018 10:41:34 GMT
Sharks used to do a scheme where they sold cheap tickets through schools and some money from every ticket went back to the school. My brother had stayed with a friend for a week and gone to watch the Sharks with the friend's cousin who had a season ticket. He'd told my mum how good it was, we went on some of these cheap tickets, my mum fell in love with Chris Finch, and we just kept going! It snowballed to season tickets and road trips to away games and finals (Coventry Skydome!), and part of choosing to apply to Newcastle university was so I could still watch basketball...
Just realised this is a good 20 years ago...aaaaargh….
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Post by faz on Aug 22, 2018 10:46:48 GMT
I used to take my kids swimming on a Sunday afternoon and depart as the game was starting. It always seemed to have z good atmosphere and jets were doing well. Departing as Calvin, Greer, O Reilly and Schneck were walking out left an imposing memory.
Money was tight and I’d imagined prices were inline with football so never went to a game. Jets did the school visit and offered tickets to parents for a fiver. I think Raiders were the visitors and Zabbas scores heavily that day. Loved it and was offered another fiver ticket the following week. Being watching BBL ever since. Prior to this was a cricket and football fan. Basketball knowledge was the dream team and the globetrotters.
As well as the excitement it was the accessibility of the players, their different mentality to over paid dumb **** heads that prevailed in football at the time that made it a great family sport to follow.
My son and I had 5 great years following Jets around the country which proved great bonding for us as a family.
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Post by notoriousbigz on Aug 22, 2018 10:53:49 GMT
That would be the work of Tim Martyn Jones - now there’s a guy who doesn’t get the credit he deserves for keeping basketball going on Merseyside. Great guy to boot as well. |
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2NFR
Global Moderator
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Post by 2NFR on Aug 22, 2018 11:14:17 GMT
Without going too far off topic, watching the backtobasics vid above reminded me of how short ... them shorts were  Can anybody remember at what point and why we suddenly we made the jump to baggy shorts and does anybody really miss them Tight shorts  This is a good thread ... well done youngnix |
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Post by connors on Aug 22, 2018 11:58:31 GMT
2NFR - Shorts were SHORT in the 80s! However I seem to recall that as Jordans popularity grew his love of longer baggier shorts seemed to spread and most local league teams made the transition by the very early 90s. Of course at that point the Fab 5s influence was also filtering through and I recall some uniforms that had ridiculously long shorts! Particularly for the guards.
For me the best thing that happened was Linford Christie making lycra shorts popular enough to be readily available in sports shops. Offered some much needed protection from those awful airtec materials that were used back then :-)
I wonder if in years to come people will look back at this era and marvel at how much "stuff" players actually wore? Some of my team mates have tights, under shirts, shooting sleeves, wristbands, hear bands, knee pads........amazing they have the strength to get up and down the court with it all on :-)
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2NFR
Global Moderator
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Favourite Team: Newcastle Eagles
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Post by 2NFR on Aug 22, 2018 16:11:52 GMT
Aye, the good old days, when real men had hairy chests, none of this back, sack and crack nonsense  ...come to think of it, woman were just as hairy as well. No shaved vajazzles back then!!  |
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