River Lions celebrate championship
The Niagara River Lions continue to proudly celebrate their first Canadian Elite Basketball League championship.
It has been a whirlwind of activity for the team and the CEBL trophy since winning the title Sunday night in Montreal.
The River Lions held a championship celebration in downtown St. Catharines Wednesday night complete with head coach/general manager Victor Raso, about half of the championship squad, champagne, food and the CEBL trophy.
“I knew they were going to do something, but they put on a heck of a spread,” Raso said.
Raso said the celebration started seconds after Khalil Ahmad hit the game-winning shot.
“We won at 8 p.m. Sunday night and it’s instantly one thing after another — celebration on the court, getting the trophy, champagne, back on the court to cut the net down,” Raso said.
The party began again at the hotel for a league sponsored event and continued on to the wee hours of the morning. The team then flew back at 10 a.m. Monday where they finally took a break and no doubt got caught up on some sleep.
“Once we landed everyone chilled for a couple of days and this will be the send off,” Raso said.
Raso said he is still trying to wrap his head around the accomplishment.
“I still don’t have the complete perspective on it yet,” he said. “It’s the most satisfying feeling. This organization has been so darn good without a championship. Now we have a championship and it’s just validation for everybody.”
Raso feels the title will help the River Lions going forward — on and off the court.
“I think it’s going to help in terms of ticket sales, in terms of players, in terms of the monkey off our back. We are no longer the Cinderella team. Now, we’re champions,” he said. “It was so cool, and to see how the fan base has grown over the past six years, I think we’ve done an awesome job of growing the brand here and I think this is just a domino to lead to long term success.”
River Lions president Jeffrey Sotiriou feels the championship could be a stepping stone to a long term commitment to Niagara.
“We’ve been working tirelessly for numerous years and it’s finally starting to develop, not just the basketball side, but the community’s really starting to buy in with our attendance and we really feel like we’re making a strong push for year 10 next year,” he said.
Sotiriou said the organization will be meeting with the City of St. Catharines as well as representatives from the Meridian Centre in the coming weeks.
“We’re hoping to secure a long term lease and hopefully we’ll be announcing something special really soon,” he said. “We’re in a multi-year lease but we want to secure a 10-year agreement. We are a smaller market in the CEBL that has grown quite a bit and want to get the buy-in and support and plant our flag here forever.”
Sotiriou said the team does not discuss finances publicly, but did say the organization is trending in the right direction.
“I think we’re really close. We’re growing it the right way and the buy-in is like nothing we’ve ever seen and hopefully this championship will take us to the next level.”
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