Basketball: Tall order for young NZ giants

Junior Tall Black Rob Loe in action. Photo / Paul Estcourt

New Zealand coach Nenad Vucinic hesitates before insisting he has faith in his baby-faced big men to stand up to Australia in the Oceania men's basketball series.

Gangly pair Alex Pledger, 22, and Rob Loe, 17, will be called on for plenty of minutes in the series which starts in Sydney on Sunday night and concludes in Wellington two days later.

Both centres comfortably clear two metres in height but are seriously lacking in international experience, a commodity that would be invaluable in trying to counter the likes of Toronto Raptors NBA powerhouse Nathan Jawai.

"We'll see how they go, the pressure is on them now," Vucinic said.

"I'm optimistic but I know there are a lot of questions being asked about them. There may be some players in New Zealand better than them right now but I'm looking forward."

The rebuilding Tall Blacks are better served in the back court, particularly through key scorer Kirk Penney, but a glaring lack of depth under the paint opened up when Pero Cameron and Craig Bradshaw became unavailable for this series.

Mika Vukona will be a key rebounding presence for New Zealand but stopping the more athletic Australian big men getting easy points under the basket could prove problematic.

Pledger has two years of United States College basketball on his CV while Loe impressed during the recent world junior championships in Auckland.

Vucinic was also impressed with how both performed during the Tall Blacks' recent tour of Europe, from which they emerged with two wins out of eight matches against mid-strength international foe.

"Alex and Rob stepped up in Europe against some tough players, some NBA level players," Vucinic said.

"The tour itself was very very valuable. It might sound out of order but I believe it was a very successful tour.

"We expected to struggle against the Europeans with such an inexperienced team but the players that we took didn't actually fear any of their opposition and I'm hoping that's going to be the case against Australia."

The Boomers are also rebuilding but would be better for a taxing recent tour of South America, Vucinic believed.

They clearly boast a stronger roster than his own but noted that didn't count for everything.

"They are favourites because they have players who are simply higher rated than ours but hopefully we can do what we know New Zealand teams can do and put a good team effort out there."

Vucinic expected outside hot-shot Penney to be targeted by the Australian defence and invited them to do so.

"Absolutely, it will be just like everybody else in the world when they play us.

"Kirk still manages to get his points. We have an offensive system that creates a lot of shots for him and he uses that well.

"Why wouldn't we use him when he's one of the best in the world?"

With both teams having already qualified for next year's world championships, there is nothing riding on the series aside from pool rankings in Turkey.

New Zealand last beat Australia in 2007, having tasted victory twice the year before that.

- NZPA