Blue Devils: 40 - Basel Gladiators: 24

So Sunday afternoon Mike and I played our first game as professional athletes, and I don't think it could have gone any better. The weather was pretty great, about 55 degrees and partly cloudy. The mountains in the background of our field were covered with a very light fog, creating a really cool atmosphere for a football game.

Mike catching his first professional TD

We played the Basel Gladiators, a team located in north-central Switzerland, right on the border with southeastern France. They got the ball first and struck quickly, scoring on the fourth play of the game to take an 8-0 lead. After we had a long kick return to the opponents 10 yard line, the scoring began. On fourth and goal from the 23 on our first drive, we scored on a TD pass to one of our Austrian wide receivers. We would end up scoring on all 5 of our first half drives to take a 33-14 lead into the half.

Rolling out left. I don't remember what happened on
this play, but we'll just say it was a completion.

The scoring slowed considerably in the second half, as the Gladiators did a nice job of keeping our offense off the field. We scored only 7 second half points, but they scored only 10, making the final score 40-24 in favor of the Blue Devils. To go out and get a win in my first professional game was pretty fantastic. To have the offense play well on top of that made it just a bit sweeter. The defensive stats have not been completed yet, but the offensive stats from the game are listed below (sorry for the poor picture quality):

Mike pointing to his adoring fans after catching
his 2nd TD of the day

To be able to play well against the competition gave both myself and our team a great boost of confidence heading into the rest of the season. The Gladiators are the same team that knocked the Blue Devils out of the playoffs in last year's semi-final game. To open this season with a win versus the same opponent lifted everyone's spirits and only increased our expectations for the remainder of the season. Next Sunday we travel to Basel, to play another team from the same town; the Basel Mean Machine.

I hope all is well back in the States, and I know the IC Blueboys start their spring football practice on April 3. That will be the start of what will hopefully be a very successful 2011 campaign for the Blueboys as they look to bring home something I could never accomplish in my time there; a MWC championship. Best wishes, and check back next week for a report on our next game.

Go Blue Devils/Boys!
Mitch Niekamp