Basketball: Gutsy Tall Blacks win place in basketball history

By EUGENE BINGHAM

Surrounded by a huddle of panting Tall Blacks, inspirational coach Tab Baldwin implored his players to believe in themselves.

It was two minutes from time and they were three points down against Yugoslavia in a basketball world championship warm-up match in Germany last month.

"When will close enough not be good enough?" the Florida-born coach asked. The pep-talk inspired New Zealand to their first win over the reigning world champions.

Yesterday, injected with a similar dose of Baldwin inspiration and helped along by a message of support from New Zealand sporting greats, the Tall Blacks surged back into the lead late in their world championship quarterfinal against Puerto Rico.

Captain Pero Cameron sank two big shots, ensuring the Tall Blacks a 65-63 win and booking them another match-up against Yugoslavia, this time in the semifinals in Indianapolis.

Baldwin revealed last night that he had used an email from some of the country's sporting heroes in his pre-match talk.

He said the message "had the names of the 1976 [Olympic gold medal-winning] hockey team and the 1982 World Cup soccer team - the Turners and the Rufers - and it said that now names like Penney, Dickel, Boucher, Jones will become part of New Zealand folklore".

Baldwin added: "It's amazing to know that something you have been a part of will live beyond you.

"I feel so good I could explode."

The quarterfinal victory was another unexpected step for a team who began racking up notable moments in New Zealand basketball history with their first victory at the Olympics two years ago and their series win against Australia last year.

Their four wins at the world championships in the past eight days have surpassed anything many basketball fans could dream of.

But it is exactly what Baldwin has visualised, a belief he has passed on to the squad.

And now New Zealand has a chance at a world championship medal, while the United States, beaten favourites, have missed out. New Zealand is through to the Olympics in 2004, the US have to qualify.

Basketball NZ chief executive David Crocker said that while a mix of factors including the huge commitment of the players - about half were semi-professionals who had to take time off work - had contributed, there was one "big X-factor", Baldwin.

"They have such confidence in him and he has such confidence in them. They believe in themselves and Tab instills that self-belief in them. It's a real strength to get those guys to know what their talents are and when is the right time to utilise those talents."

Baldwin summed up yesterday's feat saying: "I wish I spoke other languages because the English language just seems inadequate to me. Words like rapture, thrilled, unbelievable and awesome - you should be able to grab them all and mash them together to come out with a new word."

Some of Baldwin's players admitted they struggled to describe the feeling of reaching the medal round.

"It does leave you very speechless and overwhelmed," said shooting guard Kirk Penney. "We, from little New Zealand, have gone and made it into the top four in the world and made it to the Olympics."

Mr Crocker plots the Tall Blacks' path to victory back to 1997, when the nucleus of the team competed at the 1997 junior world championships.

They came 11th out of 12 (their only victory was over Puerto Rico), but key players began knitting together into the squad they have become.

In Sydney two years ago, the team footed it with the US before going down, and claimed their first Olympic scalp - Angola.

After the Olympics, Baldwin replaced longtime coach Keith Mair and took the team to another level.

Their 2-1 series victory against Australia earned them their place in the world championships.

Victories against Hungary, China, Canada and Yugoslavia on the way to Indianapolis steadily built their confidence.

Having now jostled their way into the top four and won a place in the next Olympics, the team are determined to drive on.

The Tall Blacks' sole NBA player, Sean Marks, who remains sidelined with an eye injury, said the team were not finished yet. They now believed every team were beatable, including Yugoslavia, who toppled the United States 81-78 yesterday.

"We didn't come to the world champs to lose. We're just going to see how far we can go. Who knows?"

Success is already having spin-offs for basketball in this country. The sports funding agency is promising to look favourably on requests for help with preparation for the 2004 Athens Olympics.

The Tall Blacks received $200,000 from the former Sports Foundation last year for their Indianapolis campaign. But in June, basketball lost out to 10 other sports in a list of priorities for help and money by Sport and Recreation New Zealand (Sparc), which replaced the foundation.

Tim Mahon, a performance director at the Sparc offshoot, Academy of Sport, said that when the Tall Blacks qualified for the championships he met Mr Crocker to look at how the academy could help with the international plans.

Mr Mahon said he assumed Basketball New Zealand would now come back and talk about finance for preparing its Olympic campaign.

Across the Tasman, the Australians were delighted with yesterday's victory, partly for selfish reasons. With New Zealand already in the Olympics, Australia are likely to take the spot reserved for Oceania. Basketball Australia chief executive Scott Derwin said it was important for New Zealand to do well.

"There are people around the world who thought that the Oceania zone was basically dominated by Australia. I think this now certainly puts to rest finally that sort of myth."

Who knows what new myth the Tall Blacks will create?

In Sydney, longtime coach Mair stood in awe after the Tall Blacks had gone down to top-ranked Lithuania.

"It's like the Lithuanian rugby team trying to play the All Blacks."

Now the Tall Blacks, the Lithuanian rugby team of international basketball, have a shot of making the world championship final.