Basketball: Breakers mates, NBL rivals

By PETER JESSUP

Dillon Boucher and Mike Homik have followed mightily different paths through basketball but meet in tomorrow's Waikato-Auckland national league final in very similar circumstances.

Boucher grew up in South Auckland and still lives there, has made the Tall Blacks since 2001 and is signed as a professional for the new Breakers side in the Aussie league. And tomorrow he will play a physical game of assists and defence at forward for the Titans in what is his tenth finals series.

Homik, 25, and single, was born in Hamilton but has played in the United States since he was 17. He made the Tall Blacks this year and has just signed with the Breakers.

It is his first appearance in an NBL final but he can be expected to bring the same aggressive approach to the semifinal as Boucher.

Homik was recommended to contacts at Vintage High in the Napa Valley near San Francisco by his St Johns College coach Mal Young.

He moved from there to San Jose junior college then Albertson College in Idaho, where he completed a business degree while pursuing his dream of professional sport.

While Boucher forced his way into the national team by consistent performance and 110 per cent effort, improving what was a journeyman's game, Homik connected via the internet.

He emailed coach Tab Baldwin before the world championships to ask what he had to do to make the team. Prove yourself over here was the answer. He flew home in March, joined the Stars and made the Tall Blacks for the series against the Czech Republic.

Now he is looking at the huge opportunities ahead with the playoffs this weekend, a Tall Blacks tour and Olympic qualifying against Australia. A spot in Athens next year is already guaranteed because of their fourth-place finish at the world champs last year.

"It was a random contact with Tab - I was planning to go to Europe," Homik said yesterday. "He told me there were no spots open then but it opened a door for me. I'm glad I came back, obviously, it's been a great start."

Homik is one of four Breakers in the Auckland team and he, Lindsay Tait, Casey Frank and Aaron Olson have been trading plenty of trash-talk with Boucher and the Titans' Tall Blacks captain, Pero Cameron.

Says Boucher: "The NBL goes out the door when we're all at the Breakers, the Breakers go out the door when we're with the league team."

Boucher, 27, married to Nikki with a son Jaden, 2, and a daughter on the way, came from Bell Block in Taranaki and started playing basketball after the family shifted to Papatoetoe. In 1994, aged 17, he was selected for the New Zealand junior side coached by Tab Baldwin, who called him into the Auckland team. He went on to win five titles with Auckland before shifting south to join Jeff Green's Titans last year, securing another.

It is a tough life now, training nine-to-five with the Breakers on the North Shore then driving to Hamilton for two-hour sessions with the Titans in Hamilton. But he wouldn't have it any other way.

"I'm getting a new lease of life with the fulltime training. I'm starting to work on the weaker parts of my game, whereas before there was only time to work to your strengths. So I'm developing a better all-round game.

"I feel stronger and more confident."

It was a great time to be a basketballer, he said, and a privilege to play against the world's best. The Tall Blacks were now getting invitations to tournaments they wouldn't have been considered for before beating Australia and achieving the fourth place at Indianapolis.

Boucher came from a basketballing family. Both parents played socially and his two older brothers were involved.

Homik's dad is "a rugby-head", and none of his three sisters play.

Although the style of game each will bring to the Te Awamutu Sports Centre is similar, the team approaches are vastly different. Auckland tends towards the triangle attack as favoured by previous coach Baldwin, who was in charge when current coach Kenny Stone won titles as a player. The Titans play fast and free.

"They're both great systems," said Homik. "You have to believe in them both. With Tab and Kenny it's more structured, more mental, with Jeff it's freelance and it demands more of your fitness - I love them both and I think it improves your game all-round."

The Titans can call on a wealth of finals experience. Cameron and Prem Krishna won five titles with Auckland and have two with Waikato. Most of the team are backing up after the 2002 win.

"That suggests, I think, what intensity to expect," said Boucher. The intensity in the league generally is up, he feels, because of improved player standards and the pressure on for national team spots.

Homik agrees everything is much more professional than when he left after a brief involvement with the then-Waikato Warriors. On Saturday afternoon one will have to congratulate the other then watch the final the following weekend from courtside. Boucher takes heart from the fact that the Titans have beaten the Stars four times, twice in pre-season and twice in round play. Homik reckons the odds are in his favour - "we have to win one sooner or later".

It may come down to fitness. Homik, Frank, Tait and Olson are likely to play more game-time than Boucher and Cameron and way more than the rest of the Titans, who enjoy the better bench strength.

TV details: Waikato v Auckland, tomorrow 3pm, live on TV2; Wellington v Manawatu, Lower Hutt, Sunday, 3pm, live on TV2.