Basketball New Zealand

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NZ Tall Black coach Nenad Vucinic (Photosport)

Just two days after guiding Nelson Giants to an NBL championship, new NZ Tall Black coach Nenad Vucinic has turned his attention to another challenge – getting the national menís team to the Beijing Olympics.

ìIt has been amazing week, but we now have to refocus,î warns Vucinic, who takes charge after six years as assistant to Tab Baldwin.

ìI will be bringing in new systems and the players will be expected to improve themselves as individuals so we can be better as a team.

ìIn the end, some good players are going to miss out.î

Eighteen players – one less than named last week – have gathered in Napier for a three-week camp before the Tall Blacks take on Venezuela in a three-test series (July 20-24).

American Nick Horvath has already missed out, having failed to gain NZ citizenship in time to contest the one naturalized spot on the roster. He has been replaced in the camp by Bay Hawks forward Callum Baynes.

Two others – point guard Mark Dickel and centre Craig Bradshaw – will arrive late, possibly not for another two weeks.

Dickel had a back operation earlier this year and is racing against time to make next monthís FIBA Oceania Championships against Australia, doubling as the Olympic qualifying series. He is currently rehabilitating at his Las Vegas home.

ìMark loves playing for New Zealand and desperately wants to be involved this year,î says father Carl Dickel, Vucinicís assistant coach.

ìHe has two specialists from the University of Nevada Las Vegas working with him and he will be here as soon as his body lets him.î

Bradshaw, who signed for the Brisbane Bullets in the Australian NBL last week, has missed selection in the NBA draft, but will continue to push his cause through summer league tournaments. He is expected to join the Tall Blacks a few days before their opening encounter with the South Americans.

Waikato Pistons forward Mike Homik has also been added to the squad.

ìThese kinds of things always affect the camp,î shrugs Vucinic. ìYou want to introduce a system and you have to go backwards a little bit, sometimes a lot.

ìIt depends on how quickly players pick up things, but late arrivals always happen.î

Three weeks is probably the longest the national team have ever been together without actually playing a game.

ìBut I donít think three weeks is a long time,î says Vucinic. ìInternational teams sometimes train for two-and-a-half months.

ìWe need this time to prepare for a tough schedule ahead. We have a new coach and a lot of new learning needs to be implemented.

ìIn the past, we have had games pretty soon after gathering, but that was because of the continuity we had with Tab and his systems.î

The 2007 Oceania series looms as perhaps the most important New Zealand basketball has ever faced. Since the Tall Blacks upset the Boomers in 2001, both teams have enjoyed a free passage into the 2004 Athens Olympics and last yearís FIBA World Championships.

Only the winners of this yearís championships are guaranteed a spot at Beijing. The losers face a tough repechage tournament against some of the best international teams in the world, possibly a more difficult assignment than the Olympics themselves.

The full squad is Ö