Brief von Dre Smith an die Lions Fans

Hi, my Lions fans,

I hope you all are doing great in Dornbirn and I am doing very well her in Iceland. I am going to give you my reflection on my life in Dornbirn and how my life is now here in Iceland.

Coming to Dornbirn was my first experience overseas and out of the U.S. and I did not know what to expect. Dornbirn is a wonderful city and it was really easy for me to adjust to it. The people there were very nice to me and were always willing to help me anytime I needed. The main reason Dornbirn was great is because you guys being such amazing fans and supporters made my time there one I will never forget. You guys welcomed me with open arms and I can't thank you enough for that. Dornbirn was a great place for me to start my professional basketball career. I appreciate the opportunity that Markus and Cueneyt gave me and I just wanted to go out and show that I was the right player for the job. Still to this day I sit around and tell stories to my family about my time in the great city of Dornbirn. I tell them how when I was in college I played in front of crowds of 10 thousand people and it felt just as good as when I played in front of you guys.

Secondly I want to give a special thanks to my teammates you guys are some of the best people I have ever met in my life. You guys did everything you could to make my time there a great one. One of the best memories that I have is when the team got together to have thanksgiving dinner with me because you knew I wasn't going to be able to see my family. I will never forget that and it was one of the nicest things that anyone has ever done for me. Another special moment to me is the championship game against Schwaz when I couldn't play. This is special to me because I was so proud of the way you guys went out there and beat them. Everyone thought it was going to be a easy win for them just because I wasn't playing but I knew you guys are some very talented players and you showed everybody that day. I have been a little busy but I have talked to almost everybody from the team but I will definitely make sure I keep in touch with all of you guys because you will always be my friends.

I also want to say thank you to the kids that I coached on Mondays. It was alot of fun working with you. Even though we struggled a little bit with communication because your English wasn't good yet and my German was terrible haha. You made it so much fun because of how excited you were to learn how to play basketball. Also for the record I loved that every time I coached the girls and Cueneyt coached the boys and we did a shooting drill against them we would always beat them lol. I miss you guys and I hope you are still playing basketball and learning as much as you can about of to play the game. I also want to say thank you to all the students I met on my school visits. It was fun playing and teaching you guys about basketball. It was fun playing knock out with you guys too. It was a wonderful experience for me to see how excited you guys were to have me there playing with you.

Right now I am playing for U.M.F. Grindavik basketball team in Iceland. I like it here the city is nice and the people are also. I hope the fans here welcome me just like you guys did. Iceland is a completely different place than Dornbirn but I think I will be able to adjust the same way I did in Dornbirn. We have a pretty good team and if we continue to get better on both ends of the court we will have a chance to be playing for the championship. So it should be a very exciting and fun year.

Well I just wanted to check in on the Lions fans and thank you again for all of the love you showed me when I was in Dornbirn. I wish the team the best this season I know you guys are going to go out and play very hard. One day I am definitely coming back to visit Dornbirn maybe I will be able to catch a home game. I wish the best the for the entire organization and all of the fans and hopefully I will see all of you again.

Dre