They had been through several days at a camp in Auckland where a number of keynote speakers delivered advice, help and warnings about life as a professional athlete. That business started on June 7, 1996.
Hart remembers being anxious.
"It was all a bit new for me because I had come in from virtually no coaching then so there was a lot of learning for all of us," he said. "I had not coached for a long while so there was a bit of a risk there. But we had a great management team [assistants Gordon Hunter, Ross Cooper, manager Mike Banks, media boss Jane Dent amongst them] and we had been educating players and growing their confidence in dealing with the media and sponsors and many areas because the professional game altered everything."
It was all change for Cullen, the 20-year-old known as the Paekakariki Express who had rolled past stacks of bewildered opponents in sevens and Super rugby.
"I was lucky to get picked," he said, "because the All Blacks were still the bulk of the fine '95 World Cup side.
"Then I had a nerve-racking week, waking up to ice my calf every three hours before I had my fitness test.
"It didn't feel right but I told them it was okay and kept icing it."
Cullen struggled with the wait until kickoff as doubts edged into his mind.
"But when I ran out, the pain had gone. Whether it was in my head..."
He scored the All Blacks' first try in the 21st minute and had a hat-trick by the end of the emphatic 51-10 victory then four more the following week against Scotland.
Hart's mementoes were some photographs and the match programme.
"I'm no sentimentalist but you never forget your first game as a player or coach. They are great times. It was the start of a great year and Christian Cullen was a great part of my four years coaching the All Blacks.
"I had been out of rugby for a long while and my vision of him was mainly through sevens and I had not seen a lot of him other than that but clearly he was a star in the making.
"He had the X factor. He had speed and vision which were key elements in what we were trying to introduce in terms of building the pace of the game and in terms of an attacking option, he was a big part of where we wanted to go."
Cullen recalls his nerves easing after the haka. The Samoans rattled his ribs several times but he absorbed that onslaught in what for Hart, was the most pleasing part of the young fullback's debut.
"He showed a hardness because he got hit pretty hard early. Samoa are no pushover from a physical point of view and he got subjected to some very heavy hits and what pleased me most was how he handled that and was still able to display his skill and bounce back.
"That showed a strong resilience so I was more thrilled about the way he came through the physical side of the game which showed he was up for it. He was a tough young man," Hart recalled.
Cullen was such a natural footballer that the All Black coaches used to concentrate on blending him into the patterns and encouraging him to express himself. They urged him to use his brilliance to ice the work of many good players around him.
The All Black backline that night in Napier was Justin Marshall, Andrew Mehrtens, McLeod, Frank Bunce, Jonah Lomu, Jeff Wilson and Cullen.
The All Blacks have not played in Napier since. Other sides did during the last World Cup but the All Blacks have played elsewhere.
A third year chief executive at Hawkes Bay then was Wayne Smith after returning from a stint coaching Benetton in Italy.
However, he still wanted to return to coaching and had applied but not heard about working with the Crusaders.
"I had decided to leave because I still hankered to be a coach," he said. "That was a great night at the test. We were full and I remember we had to buy all the temporary seating from Mt Smart Stadium. The next day we looked at some of the temporary seating and I think a few of the joists had moved a bit when they were incited to do the Mexican Wave."
Investment in stadiums with greater capacity in Dunedin, Hamilton, New Plymouth have claimed the All Blacks since but Napier also has a special place in Hart's memory files.
"I remember when the team was read out and I felt a real lump in my throat because it is one hell of an honour to coach the All Blacks and you remember those times and I was very grateful for that opportunity."
