Basketball New Zealand

Tall Fern logo

June 2 has become a “stake in the sand” day for the NZ Tall Ferns after their agonizing 67-71 loss to Japan in the third outing of their European tour, part of their build-up towards the Beijing Olympics.

With a target of winning four of their six games on this trip, the Kiwis have won only one of their first three and must now complete the journey with three consecutive wins to meet their own expectations. Their next opponents are Angola, whom they defeated in their tour opener … then two outings against the Czech Republic, ranked ninth in the world.

The Japanese were targeted as beatable highly opponents, placed just one spot ahead of New Zealand at 15th on the world rankings, but kept their composure better down the stretch of another close contest for the Ferns. This was the fourth game they have lost by four or less this year, all against higher rated teams.

“We are so close to getting over that hump,” insists coach Mike McHugh. “This was not a disaster,

“We did a lot of very good things and, at times, played exceptionally well, but we have to get consistency.

“We’re lacking that experience in the last quarter and that’s hurting us at the moment. The only way we can fix it is to keep playing games like this and hopefully turn the corner.”

The Tall Ferns led early against Japan, who beat them by 16 when these two rivals met in Tokyo last year, and were up by as many as nine points during the second quarter. They seemed to be cruising to victory, but began to lose their grip on proceedings in the closing stages of that period.

New Zealand trailed by one at the break and were five points back entering the final stanza, but just could not get their noses back in front.

“We won every statistical category, except field goal percentage,” laments McHugh. “We out-rebounded them, we had less turnovers, we had the same number of assists, we had more steals … but we shot 34% and they had 53%.

“The Japanese are great shooters and right now, we can’t put the ball in the hole. We also got a bit out-hustled at the end of the game too and that can’t happen to New Zealand teams.”

The Kiwis have a day to regroup before facing the Africans in Madrid on Monday and can expect an intensive video session on Sunday night. Last month, at the Good Luck Beijing tournament, McHugh inflicted a long heart-to-heart post-mortem on his players after a blowout against China, resulting in improved performances against the United States and Australia.

“That really worked for us. We identified the breakdowns and worked on them at practice the next morning … the players really responded to that.”

When that exercise is over, the Tall Ferns will understand they cannot afford any more slip ups during this phase of their Olympic campaign.

NZ Tall Ferns in Europe

Saturday, May 31
Valencia
Japan 71 NZ Tall Ferns 67 (Angela Marino 18, Jillian Harmon 10)
Q 20-22
HT 34-33 (14-11)
3Q 47-42 (13-9)
FT 71-67 (24-25)