Blazers bring professional basketball to West Virginia

By BRIAN WOODSON
Bluefield Daily Telegraph

November 08, 2008 11:30 pm

— BLUEFIELD — There’s a new professional sports team blazing its way through West Virginia and beyond.
That team is the West Virginia Blazers, Bluefield’s own entrant into the American Basketball Association.
What awaits those who wish to see the Blazers on the court? How about a 3-point play that can turn to four points, or a free throw that could turn into two points? How about points, lots of points?
West Virginia scored 148 points in an exhibition win on Thursday against the Knoxville-based Tri-City Racers. And, there’s also the red, white and blue basketball.
“They’re going to see a lot of up and down basketball, run, run and run some more,” Blazers head coach Tony Webster said. “There will be a lot of high-scoring basketball because they’ve got the 3-D mode.
“They’ve got a little rule in there that each time you get a steal in the backcourt, points count more. A red light will go on and if you shoot a 3 it counts as 4, you shoot a 2 and it counts as 3 and a each free throw counts as 2.
“That is a little bit more entertaining and a little bit more fast-paced and they’ll get up and down the floor. That is why the games are so high-scoring.”
While the 30-game regular season doesn’t start for another month, the Blazers have played three exhibition games, including their win over the Racers on Thursday at Bluefield Middle School.
“We won pretty good. I was real pleased with how we shot, we shot the ball really well,” Webster said. “We had some guys step up, and we had a pretty good crowd. It was a pretty good night for us.”
Fourteen players from five different states were selected from a pair of tryout sessions to play for the Blazers, a team owned and operated by the Bluefield Housing Authority (BHA).
“They have all moved into this area, most of them moved into the Beckley area,” Webster said. “Some of them have other jobs and most of them are still in college. One is a school teacher in Virginia so we have a versatile group of guys.”
This is professional basketball, hence, these players — all of whom are signed to a one-year contract — are getting paid, although none are getting rich.
“They’re not getting paid a lot of money with us, but it’s our first year,” Webster said. “Hopefully next year when we get established, we can give them more, but right now they are getting paid by the week and are committed to us.”
Webster, assistant coach Willie Ellison and utility manager George Cole conduct practices three or four days a week at the Raleigh County Armory, which is where the Blazers will play their home games, a facility they’ll share with Woodrow Wilson and Mountain State University.
The cost for games will be $10 for adults and $5 for students, and each night will feature some type of promotional activity. All games, home and away, will be broadcast on ESPN 1050 AM.
“I think that is very reasonable,” Webster said. “This is professional basketball, that is how much you pay for a high school game almost.”
The ABA was started in 1967, and for nine years, it had a good run. Players like Julius Erving, Artis Gilmore, George Gervin and Connie Hawkins got their start there, and four of today’s NBA teams — the Spurs, Pacers, Nuggets and Nets — were meshed into the NBA in ‘76.
While ABA ceased to exist for a few years, it wasn’t long before it was back on a smaller scale. Today, the ABA has four divisions and 36 teams in 21 states and Canada, in cities ranging in size from Bluefield to Atlanta.
The Blazers are the only team represented from West Virginia. They’ll play in the nine-team Northeast Division, which will include bus trips as far away as Detroit, Miami, New Jersey, Atlanta and Cleveland.
“The ABA actually never really died off,” said Webster, whose Blazers will use a 22-person bus owned by the BHA. “I think they may have took a couple of years off back in the seventies and then they started back up.
“Now it’s really starting to come back out to be and more people know more about it.”
The Blazers, who open their season on Dec. 12 in Nashville against the Broncs, have shown potential in preparations for the upcoming season, including posting a 1-2 mark so far in exhibition play. Both losses were single-digit defeats.
“We’re trying to get a good chemistry and get the guys to play with each other so they will know who does what and who is going to be where,” said Webster, whose Blazers’ first home game will be Jan. 4 against Nashville. “It is still a work in progress.”
Webster seems to always be in progress. The long-time coach of the BHA’s Bluefield Blazers AAU team, he’s also the coach for the Bluefield Middle School seventh grade hoops team, serves as an assistant coach for the Bluefield Beavers football team and is an inspector and residential coordinator for the Bluefield Housing Authority in Mercer County.
In his ‘spare time’, Webster finds time to coach the Blazers.
“I’ve been wearing a lot of hats right now. I’ve got a family that I still love to be around,” Webster said. “I’ve still got football, which is a first priority right now, hopefully we will be in Wheeling and then we can all concentrate solely on the ABA.
“I’m just trying to distribute my time around to make sure that each program is ran correctly. I love my coaching and I enjoy it, as long as my health holds up I’ll continue to do it.”
Professional basketball in southern West Virginia first became a possibility when the BHA received a loan to build a gymnasium in Bluefield a few years ago. While that plan fell through, the team didn’t.
“That’s how it really started. If we build this gymnasium then we can maybe bring in a professional basketball team,” Webster said. “You’ve got the Baby Birds and at that time we had the Barons (semi-pro football team) and we thought maybe we could go ahead and do basketball too locally.”
At the same time, the federal government began to cut back on funds to organizations like the BHA, which sponsors preventive programs that promote a drug, alcohol, tobacco and crime-free lifestyle, especially for at-risk kids.
Webster said that Preast, who runs the BHA and is the general manager of the Blazers, kept talking with the ABA about a team.
“She explained to them what we did and what we do and how we work with kids and about our AAU team and how our money got cut,” Webster said. “The federal government cut our money so it wasn’t there so we thought this would be a good way to raise money so we can continue to do some of these programs for our at-risk youth.
“All the money that we raise — we do take care of our players — but most of the money that we raise goes back to our kids and goes back to the community for at-risk kids.”
A long-time supporter of athletics in Mercer County, Webster thinks they serve a purpose in young people’s lives.
“I think basketball or any kind of athletics is a positive in a kids’ life,” said Webster, whose Blazers are also affiliated with the ESPN Drug Free All-Stars. “It teaches discipline and all types of different things.
“I really think basketball or any other kind of sports is a plus and gets kids involved in doing things and that seems to keep them out of trouble.”
Webster and Preast, who will served as bus drivers for the Blazers, have turned the BHA offices into a basketball junkie’s dream, full of Blazers souvenirs, including schedule cards, shirts, hats, programs and other novelties.
“It has been very hard work, and the ladies here in the office at the Bluefield Housing Authority have worked very hard,” Webster said. “Cindy works countless hours and myself and my coaching staff, we’re working hard.
“We’re trying to do this in a real professional manner. That’s the only way I think you can do it. If you’ve going to do it do it right, don’t half do something because if you do, people aren’t going to support it.”
Webster isn’t setting any kind of goal in terms of wins in this first season. He just wants a team will have a chance to win at the end.
“We’re just trying to make sure that we’ve got guys that can be competitive in this first year,” Webster said. “We’re not thinking we’re going to set the world on fire this first year, but we want to be competitive and we want to win.”
The Bluefield roster is a mixture of athletes from local colleges, including Bluefield State (Chawn Martin, Corey Love), Concord (Chris Nichols, Joey Preast) and Mountain State (Brian Kidd, Maurice Davis).
Alfred Leftwich (Woodrow Wilson), Justin Bennett (Summers County) and Neil Rasnake (Council, Western Carolina) played at local high schools. Other imports include DeNelle Hale, a point guard from Baltimore, 6-foot-6 Melvin Rodgers (South Carolina), 6-5 Desi Crisp (North Carolina), Ahmadd Boyd (Florida) and Travon Carr (Potomac State).
This team is doing more than just play basketball. The Blazers have already been active in the community, making appearances at Bridge Day and local cinemas — signing autographs and handing out flyers. They’ll host a clinic at the Beckley YMCA on Nov. 18 and will take part in “Read to Me Day” on Nov. 20 at area schools.
“It’s all about word of mouth and how you get promoted, and we have done so much in the community so far,” said Webster, who added that the Blazers will also be active with Bluefield-area youth through the Greater Bluefield Community Center. “Our guys go down there and work out. “We’re going to do some things for their youth so it is just an all-around good thing for the community.
“We’re staying pretty busy, we’re trying to keep our name out there and be a part of the community because this is a community team.”
Webster is hoping that the community will support the Blazers.
“All our proceeds do go back to the community and basketball is a way of bringing people out and having fun and we just hope people will come out,” Webster said. “We want to pack that house in our first home game
“Our goal right now is to be competitive and to win as many games as we can. But more than that, just be competitive and be role models on and off the court, that is our main goal.”
Note: More information about the Blazers with general manager Cindy Preast will be published later this month.
—Contact Brian Woodson
at bwoodson@bdtonline.com

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