Good weekend for our Sundsvall Dragon team (3-0). With only a few practices under our belt going into the preseason tournament, it was clear that there is still a lot of work ahead of us -- especially on defense. We played a Finnish team twice and Uppsala (a local team) once. We probably averaged more than 90 points as a team -- clearly offense is not a problem for us. I was the leading scorer twice with 14p (12reb) and 23p respectively, but this was a preseason game so I don't take much from it, more than a little bit of a confidence booster going into the regular season. I love our coach, Peter Öqvist, a firecracker of a coach, and he has designed a great system where every player can play every position. Our two american stars actually hail from Philly -- small world eh. Alex Wesby played at Temple University, and Michael Cuffee grew up in North Philly when he was a kid. They both know Jerome "Pooh" Allen. Of course.
Sundsvall is a small ex-industrial town, not bigger than 100,000 people. It is located in the northeast part of Sweden, and it gets blistering cold (and dark) here in the winter. The town has a few skislopes and a port, and is surrounded by two smaller mountain chains as well as massive amounts of pine forest. The city is mostly calm and quiet, but the people are extremely friendly and speak with a northern swedish accent also known as "norrlandska". People here have a huge tendancy to drink beer and use a tobacco product called "
snuff" -- even the women. I can best describe this product as chewing tobacco, but without the spitting part (they swallow it instead -- yuck). Quite disgusting actually, but everyone has their thing I guess. Sundsvall is a pretty small town, but has four elite sports teams in floorball, basketball, soccer, and hockey, which is truly amazing. There is definitely a lingering "small town" feeling which I enjoy, and everyone knows everyone around here. There are a few bars and clubs, but I haven't really checked them out yet. I am truly excited to be here.
Sundsvall at night!
As some people already know, I decided to sign a
two month temporary deal with the swedish team Sundsvall Dragons. It was just the best fit for me, both in terms of coaching style and role on the team. There was a lot of speculation as to if I was going to LF (Lulea) to play. They were the first to contact me, but we were unfortunatly not able to come to an agreement. I love it here in Sundsvall and although it will be blistering cold here in a few weeks, I have really enjoyed the culture and the people here. There will possibly be an option of an extension of the contract in two months, but that is something I'll deal with when it happens. We shall see where this journey takes me.
