It was 90 minutes before the first regular-season NBA game at the Barclays Center, and a man from Mexico and a man from England, sat a row apart up in Section 222, the smiles on their faces as irrepressible as the black in their Brooklyn Nets shirts.
“Fantastic, isn’t it?” said Mike Boyden, 22, of Sheffield, his English inflection twirling the words just enough to make basketball sound regal. “I’ve been a Nets fan for four or five years because my uncle lives in New Jersey. I’ve been through the bad times, the 12-70 season [in 2009-10] watching on TV on NBA League Pass International. This feels like a new beginning.”
One row up was Fortino Aparicio, 37, who moved from Mexico to Elizabeth, N.J., where he became a Nets fan during Jason Kidd’s heyday in the early 2000s. Now he lives in Staten Island, and after watching his neighbor’s car get crushed by tree in Hurricane Sandy while avoiding major damage to his own house, Aparicio was especially happy to watch his Nets beat the Raptors, 107-100.
“It looks so much different from the [Meadowlands] in New Jersey,” Aparicio said. “It’s 200 percent better. The team could not keep playing there.”
From the floor level of this new $1 billion arena to the suite level, seats follow a regular rising pitch. From the suites to the ceiling, in the section where Boyden and Aparicio were sitting, the stairs rise like the steep face of mountain.
But that was the plan from Day 1 — to create a feeling exactly like the one that Aparicio explained.
“Even though we’re in the second section, it feels more like a premium seat,” he said. “I don’t see the seats down there [on the floor], and it’s like I’m on top of it.”
What seemed like directly below them, about 30 rows up from the court, Gywnn Gauntlette and James Mallory were munching on fine barbeque from Fatty ’Cue, one of the many local Brooklyn restaurants serving as vendors on the concourse.
“New Jersey, what?” said Mallory, looking up from his brisket sandwich. “It’s like they were never there, like they belong in Brooklyn.”
Gauntlette explained the two moved from Williamsburg to the neighborhood surrounding the arena and they walked to the game. Mallory called the new arena “an epicenter” for the community and was excited to move so close.
“We’ve both done a lot of interesting stuff in our lives, but this feels like the center of the universe right now,” Gauntlette said. “And with all that’s gone on in the city, we feel so lucky to be here.” “It’s really great that they’re so committed,” Gauntlette said. “People from out of town, it seems like they will come to experience the Brooklyn-ness of it all.”
The two also proud of the arena’s attention to the borough, with many food and beverage options coming from local establishments such as Brooklyn Burger, Junior’s Bakery and Buffalo Boss, which had a section of its menu titled “Made in Brooklyn Snacks.”