{"id":320200,"date":"2025-10-03T23:15:12","date_gmt":"2025-10-03T23:15:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/320200\/"},"modified":"2025-10-03T23:15:12","modified_gmt":"2025-10-03T23:15:12","slug":"raptors-settling-in-as-training-camp-begins-in-calgary-spare-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/320200\/","title":{"rendered":"Raptors settling in as training camp begins in Calgary | Spare News"},"content":{"rendered":"

For the first time in nearly a decade, Canada\u2019s only NBA team, the Toronto Raptors, are in Calgary. This time, the University of Calgary\u2019s Jack Simpson Gymnasium and other facilities are hosting the team for their annual training camp.<\/p>\n

Raptors star and Canadian RJ Barrett complemented the school\u2019s facilities.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been great, good facilities here, weight room up there and stuff, no complaints at all,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Similarly, Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic said the facility allowed the team to have a productive first day of camp.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was really impressed with the facility, the floorway was awesome,\u201d the third year coach said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were able to go out there and really compete on a high level today, so it\u2019s a beautiful facility here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Training camp marks Barrett\u2019s first time in Calgary. The Toronto native said he was excited to be in the city.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s cool to be here just to bring Raptors basketball to a different part of the country,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Though practices are closed to the public, an open gym<\/a> will be held in the Jack Simpson Gymnasium on Friday, Oct. 3, at 6 p.m., the team\u2019s final day in the city.<\/p>\n

Rajakovic expects the Calgary fans to be electrifying.<\/p>\n

\u201cI expect everybody could come in great spirits over here to enjoy seeing our guys,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know that our guys are really excited to go out there and play. It\u2019s going to be great.\u201d<\/p>\n

Basketball aside, the team has a planned outing to Banff for the week.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was like 20 people (saying) \u2018you have to go, it\u2019s amazing,\u2019\u201d the coach said.<\/p>\n

Jamal Shead said that a teammate had him research the national park.<\/p>\n

\u201c(Raptors forward) David Roddy made me look it up on TikTok, he says it\u2019s one of the most beautiful, like, natural wonders of the world, so I\u2019m really excited about that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Every year, the team looks for opportunities to travel across Canada, Rajakovic said that coming to Alberta was very important for the team.<\/p>\n

\u201cI heard so many things about Calgary, how great the city is, and how people over here are welcoming. I know how much Canada is supporting the Toronto Raptors, that\u2019s not just the team in Toronto, but the whole country of Canada.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ben Matchett, UCalgary Athletics Director, said the school has done their best to roll out the red carpet for the Raptors.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnytime you can have an organization from the best professional league in the world in your facility, you want to take advantage of that and provide them the best opportunity that they can to get what they need done, done during their time here,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Matchett was appreciative of the Raptors\u2019 praise for UCalgary\u2019s facilities. He said that new additions have been made recently, including basketball hoops and a new video board.<\/p>\n

After their stop in Calgary, the Raptors will head further west to Vancouver for a preseason game against the Denver Nuggets on Oct. 6.<\/p>\n

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For the first time in nearly a decade, Canada\u2019s only NBA team, the Toronto Raptors, are in Calgary.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":320201,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3770],"tags":[7,736,6,681,34290,680,476,3820],"class_list":{"0":"post-320200","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-toronto-raptors","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-men","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-raptors","12":"tag-spare-news","13":"tag-toronto","14":"tag-toronto-raptors","15":"tag-torontoraptors"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115312782589014816","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=320200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320200\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/320201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=320200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=320200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=320200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}