Shortcuts in sport are a sure-fire path to failure, but former national league player Andrew McKay didn't hesitate in asking the New Zealand Breakers Academy to go easy on his teenage son last week.
McKay, a former Waikato Pistons national league player who is also CoachForce Bay of Plenty's basketball development officer, had a quiet word in his brother Dave's ear to ensure 17-year-old Derone Raukawa got on the plane yesterday bound for Japan, and the basketball trip of a lifetime, in one piece.
Dave McKay is on the Breakers' coaching staff and, with Raukawa coming off back-to-back national age-group tournaments and a trip to China with the Junior Tall Blacks, his dad was anxious that a late injury might derail his Tokyo excursion.
"I didn't want Derone to be given any favours, but at the same time I didn't want him to be put through too much either and risk rolling an ankle."
Raukawa, who played for Otumoetai College and the Tauranga rep team last year before moving to Auckland at the start of 2012, is one of four New Zealand players on an all-expenses-paid trip to Japan with Basketball Without Borders Asia organisation.