Duluth Harbor Monsters Excited for Return to DECC

Hosting Kansas City Goats on Sunday, June 23

DULUTH, Minn.- After earning their first regular season win on Saturday over the Ozarks Lunkers, the Duluth Harbor Monsters are eager to make it two in a row on Sunday at the DECC.

On Monday, Harbor Monsters players met and signed autographs for fans at Adventure Zone in Canal Park.

“I wanted to make sure that we were out there out in the community as much as possible.” says Steve Walters, the General Manager of the Harbor Monsters.

It was also an opportunity for the players to bond off the field ahead of Sunday’s game.

“That’s a part of being together, growing together becoming brothers,” Quarterback Javonte Johnson played a major role in Saturday’s 44-38 win.

“It was more of a big relief,” Johnson admits “Now we’ll get everything going back on track with our with our setback. It’s always good to overcome some at some type of adversity.”

“That was definitely something that everybody needed,” says Lovell Spruce, an edge rusher for Duluth. “Winning is definitely a habit. And it’s a habit you build by doing it over and over. That’s going to kind of be like a precursor for the rest of the season.”

While Johnson and Spruce have their sights sets on collecting their second win of the season, Walters is focused on having the DECC ready for gameday amid a busy weekend in Duluth.

“This is Grandma’s (Marathon) weekend, so we have a very, very short window to put together the whole entire arena,” says Walters. “We have about a day to put together an entire arena, which last time we had over a week to do it, so we had all the time in the world.”

The Harbor Monsters got a taste of playing on their home field in a preseason game back in May. However, it wasn’t just a warmup for the players.

“There was a learning curve that we needed to get done,” says Walters. “One, we had long lines wanting to get into building. We had some other different hiccups that were have now adjusted. We’ve worked with the DECC and we are going to be opening up earlier. We are going to have more staff to handle the incoming amount of people, so it should be a lot smoother and a lot more enjoyable.”

One thing has been clear from the Harbor Monsters’ debut at the DECC: The support they’ve received from their fans.

“The main thing that I learned was how excited Duluth is and how much Duluth loves this team already,” smiles Walters.

“We really appreciate all the support that we got from the Duluth people here,” says Terrence Wenzel, a defensive back for the Harbor Monsters. “It was something that I’ll never forget.”

“That was that was pretty good,” said Johnson. “And it was Memorial Day weekend, so we didn’t even think we did that many people. We got like 2,500 (people). It was really nice. We felt loved for sure.”

The Harbor Monsters’ first loss of the season came on the road against the Kansas City Goats, who ran away with the 77-52 victory. With KC coming to town on Sunday, players are ready to bear down and deliver some old-fashioned revenge.

“Last time we went to KC, we went in pretty blind,” admits Spruce. “But now, we kind of have a feel for how things are going to go.”

“I think they’re going to come out and play our best version of Harber Monster football,” predicted Wenzel. “I know that KC’s no slouch either. You know, they want to come up here and get a win here in our hometown, and we’re going to do everything that we can to make sure that doesn’t happen.”