MISL Feature
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
As the seats in Wichita’s Hartman Arena began to fill, so did the levels of excitement.
The boys were back.
After an absence of 10 years, the Wichita Wings returned to a sold out crowd that saw a thrilling opening game of the 2011-12 Major Indoor Soccer League season. While the Wings eventually fell, 16-14, to the visiting Missouri Comets, the result couldn’t dampen the enthusiasm of the community, or those within the club, as to what the night had meant.
For Wings coach Lebaron Hollimon, it reminded him of the days when he was first a ball-boy and then a player for the storied franchise in the 1990s.
“It did, it really did, it took us back to what it was like,” Hollimon said by phone on Monday. “Packed stadiums, I remember one year when we were averaging 6,000 fans in an arena that held 9,000, so you can imagine the atmosphere, and it was like that all over again.”
For Wings General Manager John Blazek, the adrenaline had been building since earlier in the week. Having seen the ticket sales the club was pulling in, he knew in advance that the game would be sold out, but seeing the reaction of the crowd and the visiting Comets players and staff to the atmosphere within the arena brought a great sense of pride.
“I think the Missouri team was extremely impressed with our facility, we’ve got a great facility to play in, and as they saw the crowd getting bigger and bigger and bigger, by 7:05 it was packed, I think they were very impressed with the environment,” Blazek said. “The energy level was very high, the coaching intensity, we also have three in-game promos where people can win $10,000 in a night, so it was a maximum fever as you could tell.”
Now the Wings are focused on maintaining the success in the stands, and finding their first victory of the season. Blazek said that before the season the team’s goal was to go 24-0 and sell out all of its home games, and while the undefeated season isn’t possible anymore, Blazek believes that the second goal is one the team can attain thanks to the approach it has taken in building a club.
“We want to put a good product out on the field, we want to have classy guys with character and we want to provide an excellent entertainment night for our fans so they come back and support us through thick and thin,” Blazek said. “I think every pro franchise wants that; we have an indoor pro football team that we do the same thing with, we really try to do everything with class.”
With his focus trained on the game at hand, Hollimon said he didn’t get the chance to step back for a moment until the end of Thursday night’s game, but when he did it left him with a feeling that the Wings were going to have a chance to be something special in the Wichita community again.
Now the boys are back, it certainly looks as though they won’t be going anywhere for a long time.
“It’s just such an incredible opportunity. I think [people] in the community hoped it would come back, but weren’t really sure if it would,” Hollimon said. “Now that it is back, I’d like to think as long as we keep putting a good product in place, they’re going to do everything they can to not let it go again.”