GMBA Clash of the Classes Basketball Tournament

國際事務室暨GMBA辦公室

撰文者／GMBA趙懿德、一年級Marten Dreger

因為疫情大家都關太久了，是時候要動一動！

GMBA校友會早在今年4月就開始籌備籃球比賽，因為疫情一直無法舉行，直到10月校內體育館開放，立即就預訂場地！

感謝胡星陽院長出席支持GMBA校友活動

GMBA Clash of the Classes Basketball Tournament在今年11月27日假臺大體育館進行，共有37位師生及校友組成4隊參賽，每隊各有有趣的隊名：Slam Dorks、Team Watchout、Tai-pans、GMBA Loungers你可以從隊名分辦出哪些是校友隊伍、哪些是同學隊伍嗎？

活動開始前，先由管理學院胡星陽院長致歡迎詞，然後由校友會王德鼎會長說明比賽規則。說明完畢，由專業裁判人員帶領胡院長主持開球，比賽一觸即發！四支隊伍進行單循環賽，之後按每隊得分總分進行冠軍及季軍賽。雖然說是校友/學生的較量，但當中有不少籃球健將，讓比賽變得非常激烈且精彩！比賽最後由Slam Dorks與Taipans爭奪冠軍，而Taipans最終以2分之差贏得第一屆籃球比賽冠軍，隊中Robert Tyler Flewelling以個人總得分65分奪得本屆的MVP！

當天除了球員外，也有50多位同學及球員家人到場支持，場面熱鬧！比賽的最後，雖然GMBA大家長許文馨執行長因上課未能親自出席，仍由校友會顧問謝冠雄教授主持頒獎，冠亞軍隊伍除獎盃以外，還有TGI Fridays及Texas Road House禮券價值元，其他隊伍也分別獲得季軍和殿軍的獎盃。在此也感謝這次活動的贊助：TGI Fridays、Texas Road House及XXL Magazine。

這次比賽最大的獲益，是每位球員都盡全力比賽，而大家卻沒有因為各自的隊伍造成隔閡，反而更進一步的連結彼此，形成更團結的GMBA Family！

劍拔弩張卻又充滿歡樂的開球儀式	身高就是優勢

27th of November 2021, was a special day for all basketball fans: GMBA’s internal basketball tournament called “Clash of the Classes” was held for the very first time in NTU Sports Center. This event, like many others, had already been planned for the middle of this year, only to be postponed by the COVID-19 outbreak.

The format of this tournament was straightforward: A total of 4 teams (GMBA Loungers, Slam Dorks, Tai-Pans, Team Watchout) would play against each other in 3 round-robin games to determine the top 2 and bottom 2 teams. Then these pairings would then form the playoffs, the final matches of the day to determine which team would be able to claim 1st place.

The event was started with a short opening speech by Edward Wang, President of GMBA Alumni Association and main organizer of this event. A second short speech was given by Prof. Hu, Dean of College of Management, and after this, the games were started.

The first games were incredibly fast-paced, and it became clear that none of the teams wanted to take the tournament lightly, even though it was a friendly competition. Although the speed of the game slowed down a bit in the subsequent matches, the level of play remained high during the whole tournament. There were even moments of drama: Team Watchout had the unfortunate handicap of having the smallest number of players actually showing up. This meant their players had to play without any break and so they quickly recruited a walk-in spectator to help out playing for them. In the end it was little use, because the competition was just too fierce, but it was certainly nice to see this moment of GMBA team spirit unfold.

It became clear quite early, that the teams were a bit unbalanced, with Tai-Pans and Slam Dorks effectively crushing their opposing teams in the first match, so the question soon became: Which of these two teams would take home the trophy for 1st place? In the round-robin game, the Tai-Pans managed to defeat the Slam Dorks with 53-35, so it would appear that they could easily win the whole event. However, due to the format of the tournament, the playoffs would decide the final winner, meaning that both teams would need to give it all they got in their last game. It turned out that the Slam Dorks had probably used this knowledge to conserve some energy, as the final game was much closer and ended with the Tai-Pans winning only by a small margin (final score: 29-27). The final result of the tournament was as follows: 1st: Tai-Pans, 2nd: Slam Dorks, 3rd: GMBA Loungers, 4th: Team Watchout.

In the following award ceremony all players received their respective individual medals and a team trophy. The players of the winning team furthermore received a 2000 NTD voucher for a barbeque restaurant. The special award for the “Most Valuable Player” was given to Robert Flewelling of the Tai-Pans, who had shown a number of very strong plays throughout the whole event and who had certainly played a big part in the teams’ success.

The event was coming to an end with all of the teams captains giving a short speech. All of them emphasized the importance of team spirit not only in their team of the tournament, but in the whole GMBA family. To underline this, several photos were taken of the individual teams, but also of all the players together as “Team GMBA”.

The whole event was set up very professionally, with referees and assistants who knew what they were doing, no major injuries or troubles, quite a number of spectators either from GMBA or family of the players, and last but not least a meaningful but not overboarding selection of prizes and trophies. It was great fun to watch and I hope that this type of event can be repeated sometime again in the near future.

最有價值球員Robert Tyler Flewelling, GMBA Class of 2023	比賽結束大合照，很累但也很快樂