Raptors fandom is fierce on Canada’s East Coast
HALIFAX— This has been a month that Raptors fans on the East Coast won’t forget.
The team has clawed its way into the hearts of fans, old and new, across the country. In Halifax, the city where they played their first exhibition game in 1995, the fandom is fierce.
Despite game start times of 10 p.m. local time, Maritimers are staying up to watch and cheer on Toronto’s historic playoff run. Capacity crowds of 1,000 have packed Halifax’s Jurassic Park to watch every game, with the overflow spilling onto and closing neighbouring streets.
The city’s Jurassic Park was the brainchild of Halifax-based sports and entertainment agency Tidal League Inc. The trio behind the agency began planning for the Rogers Square viewing party events on May 27, three days before Game 1 of the NBA Finals between Toronto and the Golden State Warriors.
They pulled it together in time, and fans have packed the block party site ever since.
“I want to say I’m surprised by the support, but Halifax has shown time and time again that we are a city that comes together to make things happen,” Tidal League Inc.’s Gab LeVert said.
Halifax is a basketball city, having long hosted the men’s national university championships. Although it has jumped around to various Canadian cities since the early 1960s, the vast majority of events have been held in Halifax.
Katherine Brien, executive director of Basketball Nova Scotia and former game operations and events co-ordinator for the Raptors brand, told the Star the team has been embraced by every generation, from young people to their parents and grandparents.
“Walking around, even in Halifax, you see Raptors clothing everywhere. People are fans, they wear the clothes,” Brien told the Star last month.
There’s 5-year-old fan Sammy Purcell who asked his father for six months to get a haircut to match his favourite player, Danny Green. His father let it happen in honour of the Finals.
Then there’s superfan Trevor Labrador. He’s the first in line for every Jurassic Park party, volunteering to help set up and staying late — games typically wrap up around 1 a.m. — to help clean up.
Halifax artist Mike Burt, with his former partner Joey Cook, was responsible for the 2016 We the North mural on Blowers St. in downtown Halifax.
“I’m obsessed with basketball, to be honest. That might have been why I got the gig for the Toronto Raptors,” Burt, a fan since the team first formed, told the Star. “I’ve been a fan of basketball since I could walk around.”