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It's 6:30 am on Sunday morning and I'm badly hungover. My bedside alarm goes off and I slowly reach over and hit the off button. My head throbs and my mouth tastes like I've been licking the beer off the floor of some filthy bar. I roll out of bed and get dressed not forgetting to pull on my well worn 'lucky' David Robinson jersey (the white home strip because we're playing at the Alamodome today). I stumble into the lounge room and turn on the TV, flick the remote over to ESPN and turn up the pro-logic system nice and loud.
My heart beats a little harder and I feel butterflies welling in my stomach. It's the first game of the Western Conference Finals and my beloved Spurs are playing the Portland Trailblazers. I'd give anything to be at the Alamodome right now with the 30,000 odd other Spurs fans cheering the guys on to victory but I live on the other side of the world in Australia and besides, I've got to work later on tonight.
I go into the kitchen, put some pizza that was left over from last nights celebrations (which only ended three hours ago) into the microwave and crack open a beer. Normally I'd opt for a strong orange ceylon tea and toast but todays a big game, and it's always a little better if you have a brewski while watching the basketball!
As the not so talented ESPN International commentators go through the lineups and talk about how the Spurs 'surprised' their beloved Lakers in the second round I turn the heater on and grab a video and start taping the game. There's fifteen minutes till tipoff so I decide to jump on the computer and say hello to the usual suspects in the WOAI Chatroom.
There are a few familiar 'faces' in the chatroom. Onursal from Turkey, Spurn from Indianapolis, Brian from Korea and Webmonkey who's lucky enough to live in San Antonio. After I've gone over the usual speculation and traded insights with the guys I say goodbye and logoff. Sometimes I stay and listen to Jay Howard's game call on WOAI but today I'm lucky enough to have the game live on ESPN today.
On my way to the lounge room I stop off for another beer.
As the game starts the Spurs step away with a nice lead and I bounce around on the couch with excitement. Mario Elie puts in a three from the corner and I jump off the coach and yell "BANG!". My fiancé, Erin, screams at me from the bedroom to shut up and turn down the stereo.
I turn the stereo up a little more and yell out to her to come and watch the game. As usual she never does.
As the Trailblazers rope in the Spurs lead I get edgy and start chewing on a pillow.
"We can't lose another Conference Finals" I think to myself "This is our year!"
A finals appearance means double to me. If we win not only will I be pumped because of the obvious reasons but then maybe then NBC will start showing more Spurs games. At the moment I only get to see a handful of regular season games and all of the playoffs. If the Spurs advance then I can stop getting tapes sent to me from across the globe and watch more live games.
It just isn't the same seeing a game that's three weeks old when you know the result and have been over the boxscore more than once.
As the Spurs go into the half with a one point lead I grab my notepad and start writing a few notes down on the game. I decide that I'll do a write up on the game later for my Spurs website if I have time.
During the second half I start up a "GO SPURS GO!" chant. It's not exactly like being in the thick of the action but it'll have to do. I look around the room and see that no one has joined in with me.
It's not easy getting a chant going when you're the only one there.
I do have one friend that is a Spurs fan, but the problem is that he lives eight hours drive away from me and he's only fourteen.
NBA basketball isn't the most popular sport in Australia, and the NBA fans that you do meet are nearly always either Bulls, Laker or Magic Fans.
Erin comes into the lounge room this time and tells me to quit it with the "GO SPURS GO!" I decide to do just that because my head is still throbbing from the hangover.
As the final seconds tick away the Spurs blow a nine point lead and let the Blazers to within two points of the lead. Portlands Rasheed Wallace has the ball with less than five seconds remaining in the game and lets fly with a long jumpshot to tie the game. As the ball bounces off the rim and over the backboard I scream out an almighty "YEAAAAAAAAAAH!" and start dancing around the lounge room.
Erin looks at me like I've just climbed over the wall of an asylum so I decide to go and chat with some guys that understand my obsession.
I log back into the WOAI Chatroom and give my opinions on the game. As I'm doing this I also add the game updates to my Spurs site and check up on the boxscores. After an hour or so of analysing the game with Spurn I say goodbye and head back off to the lounge room.
I rewind the game tape and watch the game over again. I only last till the second quarter and then I'm asleep, already dreaming of game two on Tuesday.
Gene Hoffmann is the webmaster of Spurs Central.
