Recapping Our First Victory!!!

If you didn’t check social media or weren’t at the game…the Firebirds won their home opener against the Rocket City Flight! 🔥🔥🔥🥳🥳🥳 Today, not only will I share some fire pics with you guys from the game, but I’m going to give you my take on how the game really went, not just the nice media spin.

If you haven’t checked out my full game recap, detailing what happened quarter by quarter, I’d give it a read for context. Here are my quick takeaways about the team:

1. We have a deep roster. Daequon Antoine, Shaq Dance, and Glenn Robinson II are all out with minor injuries, and it didn’t affect the team too much. Obviously, we’ll be better with them back, but Tre Gray did an amazing job in his debut with the team, scoring 21 points and helping the Firebirds go from tied to leading by 10 points in the third quarter. Big man William Vedder—who I thought wasn’t going to be getting many minutes, let alone starting—was our leading scorer with 28 points.

2. While the Firebirds have a lot of potential, they played like it was their first game together. There was a lack of defensive discipline and a lot of times, guys tried to poke the ball out of the hands of opposing players instead of hustling back on defense. It cost the team at least 20 points in transition buckets.

My biggest issue with the game, however, wasn’t the players or anything on the court; rather, the referees gave me a headache. The refs were very young, and it showed with so many of their goals. On the very first play of the game, when Vedder was posting up, the opposing big man wrapped his arms around him, a deliberate foul. However, the ref—standing not ten feet away—completely missed the call. There were many ticky-tacky calls, late calls, and missed fouls that the players and coaches attempted to remind the refs of. The refs looked very young, and you could tell they hadn’t been refereeing professional basketball for very long.

Aside from the refs, however, the game was awesome! It was a great environment, and watching the players go at it reminded me of how much I missed watching the Firebirds ever since last season ended.

If you’ve been to a Firebirds game before and haven’t gone since, I know you’re missing the excitement too!

As happy as I was about the crowd and atmosphere on Saturday…

We have another game this Friday, on March 8th. It’s at 7 PM, and Firebird Focus readers will help make the place standing-room only. We’re not trying to politely welcome the Coastal Georgia Buccaneers to Raleigh; we’re trying to intimidate them and show them the Firebirds aren’t a team to be trifled with.

So what are you waiting for? Tickets are on sale for Friday, and the discount FIREBIRDS5 is still active.

-Tex