Basketball: Final highlights homegrown talent in NBL

By PETER JESSUP

The Tall Blacks this week begin an intensive training regime ahead of their incredible assignment against the Dream Team and others stars of world basketball at the Sydney Olympics, after the best possible result from the national finals series played out at the weekend.

Auckland's winning of a sixth title, 95-78, in a three-quarter thriller - Nelson simply ran out of steam towards the end - was incidental compared to the importance of the improvement shown by homegrown talent.

The finalists each played with only one of the two allowed imports, with Auckland's Bryan Christiansen top-scoring for his side with 21 and winning their most valuable player award, while Nelson's Damon Johnson played only a minor role.

But as in the Friday night semifinals, when the two-game show was stolen by the enthusiasm displayed by North Harbour and Tall Black guard Mark Dickel, Saturday's final belonged to other Tall Blacks, Auckland'se Pero Cameron and Paul Henare, Nelson's Tony Rampton and Phill Jones.

They were ably assisted by a range of others, all in their early 20s, who are not far short of the international side.

Auckland's captain, Dillon Boucher, had to be close to making the Sydney Games squad, proving his class in lifting the injury and defection-depleted Rebels through four must-win round-robin games to make, and then take, the final. Mason Le Pou shot seven from eight free-throws among an important 18 points, but it was his defence that stood out even more.

Lindsay Tait is a kid from Avondale College drafted into the Rebels midway through the season. He played six minutes in the most important league game of the year at the North Shore Events Centre, and in no way looked short of ability.

Judd Flavell was as good for Nelson as Le Pou was for Auckland.

The Tall Blacks go into a five-day camp in Nelson on Wednesday, have a two-day break at home, then go into their next camp in Morrinsville for five days. Then they have two more days off, go to Christchurch for five days, have two off, then make final preparations in Wellington for five days before departure for Sydney.

In action at the weekend with team captain Cameron and Henare, Jones, Dickel, Rampton and Brad Riley were fellow squad members Nenad Vucinic and Ralph Lattimore, of the Nelson Giants, who are retiring after the Games. Wellington's Peter Pokai and Otago's Robert Hickey will join the squad in Nelson.

The last two in the 12 are the Auckland's Kirk Penney, who left the Tall Blacks after their win in the William Jones Cup in Taiwan to tour Italy with his University of Wisconsin team and is expected at the Christchurch camp, while Sean Marks, the only New Zealander with United States NBA experience, is expected to arrive in Morrinsville.

Another at the finals who must be close to national team representation is Auckland coach Tab Baldwin, thrice rejected by the people who decide such things. Maybe it is his American accent.

After the Auckland team members had been lifted one by one to cut a strand of the net string from the winning hoop, Baldwin was hoisted by the squad to snip the last one, dropping down and shaking his head in disbelief that the final had gone exactly as he had dreamed it would.

"It was exactly as we scripted it - hammer them defensively then work our offence at the end - and it was such a pleasure to see it all pan out.

" It was unbelievable," he said.

Veteran Kenny Stone retired last year with bad knees but answered an SOS to play for 16 minutes, getting 10 points and four crucial rebounds at a time when the tallest player on the court, Rampton, was taking charge of the boards.

Nelson led 26-24 after the first quarter, 44-43 at the halftime break, and 64-61 at three-quarter time.

Baldwin worked his bench, including Stone, and the Rebels scored an incredible 34 points in the last 12 minutes, Nelson managing only 14, and half of those in the dying couple of minutes when the trophy was already Auckland's.

It was a physical contest, with Auckland putting on an unsettling defence, unlike the free-flowing semi with Waikato that had put the Giants into the last game. The Rebels notched 20 fouls by the break, 33 at game's end, sharing them around the team and only forward Daryl Cartwright getting sat down for six.

Cameron had five and so did Simon Mesritz, Boucher and LePou had four each, Stone three. Jones was also fouled out, just short of two minutes from the end, after some violent reaction to the Aucklanders' tactics.

He had scored an amazing 22 points in the first three quarters but was kept scoreless in the last.

The time statistics told the winning and losing of the game.

The Rebels' starting five averaged just over 33 minutes of court time each, the Giants' five averaged just under 40. Auckland used 10 players, Nelson seven.

"The fresh legs helped them, sure, but they ran some pretty good systems," Lattimore said.

"There isn't a lot of defence played in this league and Auckland play great D."

Of the refereeing and the fouls called, Lattimore said he expected things would be very different in Sydney where "no one will get away with holding like they do here."

Nelson captain Vucinic credited Auckland's intensity, especially in the last quarter, when they were quicker to and with the ball.

"The depth helped them but we've played with seven all season and we thought we'd do it OK," Vucinic said. "We've been struggling to play like a team all year but that was it, we did it at the end."

The only disappointment for the league was the empty seats at the Events Centre. The crowd was around 1500 short of capacity despite good representation from Nelson - the price of live television coverage, perhaps.