KEY POINTS:
The mountain New Zealand must scale to reach Beijing became obvious as they tried to leave the venue of the men's basketball Olympic qualifying tournament in Athens today.
After losing their final pool match 71-89 to Germany, the Tall Blacks found themselves stuck for nearly half an hour in the car park.
An enormous crowd was arriving to watch hosts Greece, the team New Zealand must somehow topple in the quarterfinals on Saturday morning (NZT) to have any chance of competing at the Beijing Olympics.
Only the top three teams qualify for the Games so a loss on Saturday will see the Tall Blacks fail to reach the Olympics for the first time since 1996.
Guard Michael Fitchett agreed beating tournament favourites and world championship silver medallists Greece would be a massive challenge but one his team wouldn't shy from.
"It's going to be 20,000 people there and they're pretty loud so they are going to have everything going for them," Fitchett said.
"But it's a game we can win.
"They put five guys out there and we put five guys out there and we play ball.
"We're not going into the game thinking we've lost. We know we can hang with anyone."
Tournament statistics weigh heavily against the Tall Blacks apart from one - they boast the tournament's leading scorer.
Forward Kirk Penney poured in 29 points against Germany, to follow his 25 against Cape Verde on Tuesday.
He was supported by 14 from forward Pero Cameron, who Fitchett believed was showing signs of his best all round form.
However, the traditional teamwork of the Greeks was something that would need more than individual skill and an increasingly heavy reliance on outside shooting to overcome.
Fitchett said the thinking caps would be on for 48 hours.
"I don't think Greece have a guy who averages over 13 points," he said.
"They're kind of like Australia in that all 12 of their guys can do something on defence. Offensively they run a lot of ball screens ... and their big guys can all step out and shoot.
"We just need to be a bit smarter than them."
Both New Zealand and Germany had already qualified for the quarterfinals before today's match but Fitchett denied his team were guilty of looking two days ahead.
"We don't take games lightly, we're not good enough to be able to do that," he said.
"Like (coach) Nenad Vucinic says, if we don't play hard, we'll lose these games by 50 points.
"In the back of the mind there was that comfort of knowing we're not going home but people were trying to avoid Greece so both teams were going as hard as they could."
It was New Zealand's fifth loss from five meetings with Germany, with seven-time National Basketball Association all-star forward Dirk Nowitzki often untouchable in compiling 35 points. Los Angeles Clippers centre Chris Kaman scored 20 points.
Penney and Cameron were excellent in the first quarter, which New Zealand won 26-23 but with Cameron in foul trouble, the Germans shot 47-33 clear by halftime.
"Kirk shot the ball really well, it's unfortunate we got blown out pretty bad in the second quarter," Fitchett said.
"We started well and threw a few punches, not literally, but they handled it well and came back."
Craig Bradshaw and Mika Vukona worked hard under the basket but still lost the rebound battle, an area where Greece will be especially proficient - particularly in-form forward Antonis Fotsis.
While New Zealand are averaging 23 per cent team shooting through two games, Greece are the only team in the tournament at more than 40 per cent, perhaps the biggest hurdle to overcome.
- NZPA
