If you’ve ever gone to a Flint City Bucks game and wondered what the energetic group of fans with flags and colorful gear are doing in the northwest corner of Atwood Stadium, you can just go join them and find out. You don’t even need to bring your own musical instrument.
“Come hang out with us, come cheer with us,” said David Sanders. “If you want a drum, I have 16 of them sitting in the shed right now that we got donated from Davison High School. I’ll give you a drum. I want them out of my house. We’re just a great group to come hang out with and cheer and be loud and obnoxious and raucous and happy with. That’s pretty much what we promote.”
The River Rats are the Bucks’ official supporters group, and formed essentially as soon as the franchise moved to Flint in 2019. They’ve been a fixture in their familiar corner of the stadium ever since, and welcome anyone who wants to become a part of the group to come and hang out with them.
“We hope that people see us down there having a blast, and that they decide to come over and join us,” said River Rat Matthew Kapala. “If someone’s walking over towards our group, we’re 100% going to be like, ‘Hey, come on over. Here’s a beer. Here’s a hymnal.’”
The hymnal, of course, is for the many creative songs that the section chants during games, including ‘Glory Glory to Flint City,’ ‘Midwestern Family,’ ‘We Are Flinttown,’ and ‘Atwood Stadium,’ among others, all sung to the tune of familiar songs.
Kapala has been a part of the group, which is informal and open to anyone who wants to join with no leadership structure or governance, since the team’s inaugural season at Atwood.
“When we found out we were getting a team in Flint, there was this huge Facebook group with like 1,000 people in it, and it was before the team was named or we knew where they were gonna play,” Kapala said. “And it was just like, ‘What are we gonna do? How are we gonna get a group together?’ And it just has grown from there, and I’ve never stopped coming since.”
Kapala is likely familiar to regular Bucks game attendees – his voice is often heard via megaphone providing a running and hilarious commentary throughout games. This ranges from typical sports fan banter like complaints about missed calls (“The card is in your pocket!”) and opposing players (particularly when they less than artfully flop to try and get a call), to regionally-specific banter (including jokes when opposing teams have less flamboyant supporter groups in attendance, like Forward Madison FC’s sad flag that their fans had trouble unfurling during a Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup matchup earlier this year).
“It’s incredibly fun, and, like, lots of beer, obviously is required,” Kapala said. “But also the team’s always so good that it’s easy to be like, ‘Okay, they’re coming over and they’re applauding us after the game, so we’re doing something they like,’ so you want to keep doing it every minute of the game. A lot of times we’ll kind of workshop a little bit before a game. ‘We’re playing this city, what kind of dirt is there that we can look into?’ Any time we play Grand Rapids, we’re gonna talk about Amway, stuff like that. A lot of it’s just the group, they’re really good people who are easy to bounce ideas off of. It’s pretty sweet.”
Welcoming to All
Sara Johnson didn’t consider herself a sports fan when she started going to Bucks games, but knew friends who sat in the River Rats section. Johnson is connected to Flint’s music scene as a former manager of Flint Local 432, and equates the energy in the River Rats group to a concert.
“It has a lot of vibes like a concert environment,” Johnson said. “When you’re there, there’s singing, there’s chanting, there’s yelling, there’s even drums, and the same sort of community sense that you get in the music world. Seeing all of that encouraged me to come hang out for the next one. I wasn’t much of a sports person in general, but that really just hooked me immediately and I’ve been going ever since.”
Johnson’s sports fandom has grown as a result of being a part of the group, picking up nuances of the game and even beginning to follow other sports.
“Just being there feels welcoming,” Johnson said. “It’s outdoors and you are surrounded by people. When you’re there and everyone who does understand what’s happening sort of collectively is like, ‘Whoa, that was obviously a foul,’ you start to pick up on what’s happening. And from that point, it gets easier to get involved. I actually, not only do I have season tickets for the Bucks, but I have season tickets for the Pistons now because it sparked a whole new interest in sports now that I’ve been going to the Bucks games.”
Sanders also found a welcoming community when he was in search for something to occupy his time. He’s a nurse and was working third shift during the team’s first season in Flint.
“I needed something to kinda keep me up during the day, because working third shift, you have to switch to day shift to hang out with your family,” Sanders said. “Randomly on Facebook, I saw they had a new soccer team in Flint, it was their first year (here). I’m like, ‘I gotta go see this.’ I went, had a blast, loved it, came to another game. We had seats with the regular crowd, and then I saw these guys who were down there in the corner just having a grand old freaking time, so I was like, ‘I gotta be part of that crew.’ So next game, that’s where we ended up. We sat there with the River Rats and just hung out with them, and, and it’s grown from there.”
The group truly includes fans of all ages and knowledge levels who join in the fun. Chad Schlosser, who lives in Mott Park and said his 10-year-old son was actually coached by Bucks player Tweneboa “Bingo” Kodua during a Flint Style Soccer session, frequently sits in the River Rats section and brings his kids.
“They’re really good soccer players, but they’re also just like normal college students, a lot of international students, just normal people that are just enjoying their summer in Flint, living at UM-Flint, hanging out downtown,” Schlosser said. “So it’s really fun to be able to welcome them into our community and help them have a positive experience here, and then go and become ambassadors to say, ‘Hey, there’s really cool things happening in Flint.’ We love having them here.”
The River Rats have even watched one of their group members grow up right in their section, starting cheering with them as a child and now getting ready to graduate high school.
“In 2019 when we started, he was, I don’t know, maybe 12 years old, and his grandpa and his dad came and asked if he could sit with us,” Kapala said. “He sat with us for one game, and showed up the next game. They went to a pawn shop and bought him a little snare drum. Now he’s a senior in high school, and he’s in the band at Powers, and still comes to the games. We literally watched this kid grow up, and it’s just because he came over and asked if he could join.”
Supporting Causes
The River Rats may not be an official group, but they have organized and worked together to support causes in the community. They’re one of many soccer supporter groups that participates in the annual Prideraiser fundraiser, a coalition of groups that raise money for LGBTQ+ charities in their local areas each year. This year, the River Rats are raising money to support Wellness Services. Donations and pledges can be made online.
The River Rats section frequently displays Pride flags as well as flags representing the many countries Bucks players have come from over the years. Showing care and being inclusive are core components of the group’s values.
“We seem to really all be naturally like-minded,” Johnson said. “The Bucks themselves stand for being a community-oriented organization. I’m queer myself, so the Prideraiser is a personal cause for me. And I’m always appreciative of the support from the River Rats and from the Bucks. It is something that we all just seem to share.”
Sanders said that it is fulfilling to be a part of a group of people that want to support the community.
“It’s very powerful to me,” he said. “I see the River Rats and the soccer community as a whole as a method for community change. We’re also big proponents of Flint Style Soccer. We advertise for them and hype them up all the time and we’ve gone to their big game they held at Atwood. We showed up with our drums and cheered for them. A lot of us are all active in the community, and we all just kind of push each other to do that.”
During Bucks games in Grand Blanc in the U.S. Open Cup, the River Rats could also be heard chanting in support of striking nurses at Henry Ford Genesys Hospital.
“I’ve always grown up in a union family and I mean, it’s obvious to me to support better nurse-to-patient ratios and paying nurses,” Johnson said. “So I think that is sort of where we all come from, just supporting what feels obvious to us.”
Meet the River Rats This Season
The River Rats group has grown, but it hasn’t been linear due to the pandemic. Coming off of a national championship in 2019, there was immense interest in Bucks soccer, but Kapala said that they’ve had to steadily climb back up post-pandemic. It helps that the team is consistently good, and they’re excited to potentially meet new River Rats this season.
The home season for the Bucks starts on May 30 against Kalamazoo FC. The River Rats have pregame tailgates planned on four Saturdays during the season, in the grassy area outside of Atwood. Here are the dates and links to the Facebook events to RSVP for each one:
- May 30: Pre-Match Tailgate (Bucks vs. Kalamazoo)
- June 6: Pre-Match Tailgate (Bucks vs. Midwest)
- June 27: Pre-Match Tailgate (Bucks vs. Oakland)
- July 11: Pre-Match Tailgate (Bucks vs. Macomb)
Schlosser said that the theatrics and enthusiasm of the River Rats section adds to the overall fun and ambiance at Bucks games, and he hopes others want to join this season.
“Over like two or three seasons, I just gradually moved a little closer and a little closer to the River Rats,” Schlosser said. “Last year I was just like, ‘All right, I’m all in. I’m hitting the drum, and I’m just having fun.’ It’s more fun than just kind of sitting there watching. We’re involved in the game in a way. Just come hang out. We’ll give you a hymnal, and you can sing along with us, and it’ll be amazing.”
Johnson said sitting in their section is a great way to grow your love for the Flint City Bucks, by meeting a lot of other people who care deeply about the team and its success in Flint.
“We are not as loud and scary as we seem,” Johnson said. “Well … we are kind of loud, I guess, but it’s all love and it’s all positive. And community is such a huge part of what soccer is. It is arguably one of the largest worldwide communities there is. And that’s what we want people to feel. Sports fans or not, everyone of all ages can enjoy hanging out at the games, spending their summers together. I think we just really want people to see that part of it. And hopefully along the way, they grow to love the Bucks as much as we do.”
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