Basketball: Hawks veteran want 3 x3 format pathway in HB

Hawks players Alonzo Burton (left) and Everard Bartlett after returning with 3 x 3 silver medals from the Fiba Asian Cup basketball tourney in Mongolia late in October. Photo/supplied

The format has an aura of swish-and-snigger about it, akin to the hit-and-giggle flavour of Twenty20 cricket every summer.

But the Taylor Corporation Hawks co-captain Everard Bartlett and Taranaki Mountainairs guard Alonzo Burton have discovered that three-on-three basketball is no giggling matter.

Bartlett, Burton, Roy Fannon, of Auckland, and Tom Vodanovich, of Wellington, have returned with silver medals won at the 3 x 3 Fiba Asian Cup in Mongolia late in October.

Just as their cricketing cousins, sevens and Fast5 netball, the Kiwis found out the spin-off from the abbreviated game is quite staggering.

"A lot of countries are hosting the game, there's a lot of big cash prizes and it's likely to go on to become an Olympic sport," says Bartlett of the three-a-side game played on one hoop.

It is touted as the largest urban team sport in the world.

"If you win a tournament you get like $30,000," says the 31-year-old of Napier of the Fiba-sanctioned format whose origins can be traced to informal versions played in streets and gyms around the world.

It dawned on Bartlett and former Hawk Burton that many nations who turned up at the global gatherings were court savvy because they are affiliated to an annual Fiba 3x3 World Tour, comprising a series of masters and one final tournament awarding six-figure prizemoney in American dollars.

BBNZ has started a Quest Tour around the country so the winners from each centre then have a rumble in Auckland. Whoever prevails in the tourney then earn the right to enter an invitational event overseas.

Bartlett, who runs his own company, EB Sports Development, has embarked on a campaign to try to entice BBNZ organisers to make a stopover in the Bay for a tourney.

But he firmly believes the potential for New Zealand is enormous so it's imperative to invest in the future. Last week he conducted clinics for year 7-8 Flaxmere pupils at Peterhead School, culminating in a tourney, to help hone their skills.

He is indebted to Burton, who is working at William Colenso College in Napier, for helping him try to better equip more Bay youngsters to go on to fly the provincial flag through New Zealand on the 3 x 3 global platform.

"I'm bringing an awareness to it now in term four," he says, hoping to organise a tourney involving Wellington over summer before staging another competition in term one next year.

He suspects some fringe Hawks players also may be interested in the open men's Quest Tour so running weekend tourneys for adults may become the norm for their preparation and registration.

"It's another opportunity to represent your country and probably also go on to become professional 3 on 3 players."

Bartlett says his business is to offer an elite one-on-one coaching pathway to acquire those goals.

"I teach them on what [Tall Blacks coach] Paul Henare is looking for if you want to play at the top level — what you've got to eat, how do you act and all the stuff they need to know if they want to make it in basketball."

Bartlett's also ventured outside the Bay, for example, conducting shooting clinics in Hamilton.

"I only took 15 so all my sessions are maxed out so it's been received pretty well."

He says Burton's represented his country and his Tall Blacks experience is invaluable although he is still weighing up his options on what he intends to do. The son of former player Willie Burton was named in the tourney team in Mongolia.

Bartlett's schedule also is hectic although he did wonder what he was going to do after not securing a contract with an ANBL franchise contract this season.

"I thought I would be doing nothing since I hadn't signed with an ANBL team. I thought I'd just be here but I've been travelling now more than when I had been playing," says the Hastings-born guard who last week returned from a "street madness" Australia Nike and Foot Locker invitational tourney in Melbourne.

Bartlett, whose team comprised an Olympian and a Boomer in Melbourne, has plied his trade with the Adelaide 36ers, Perth Wildcats and NZ Breakers last season.

In the Mongolia 3 x 3 tourney, the hosts won gold at Ulaanbataar.

The Kiwis beat Australia 21-12 first up and then pipped Qatar in the four-pool tourney.

The second-seeded New Zealand side thrashed Kyrgyzstan 21-9 in the quarterfinals and then pipped No 3 seed Kazakhstan 20-18 in the semifinals.

Mongolia, who beat Australia 19-17 in their semifinal, overwhelmed the Kiwis 19-14 in the final.

Anthony Corban, of Hamilton, who is Basketball New Zealand's 3 x 3 coaching supremo, selected the team.

It was the first time a New Zealand team had ever won a medal in the short-form competition globally.

Bartlett says it was also the first time Kiwi professional players had represented the country in the format.

"We only trained like five times together and then went away."

He and Burton were pretty much rookies in the 3 x 3 arena.

"But it was an eye opener in going to our first tournament to find out Mongolian team do a world tour for a month even before they played in the tournament."

The Kiwis, who also beat Japan in an exhibition warm-up game leading into the tourney, discovered their opposition have a fulltime professional 3x 3 league.