Froling’s dad backs big man to rise to challenge facing Utah superstar Ready for all that Jazz

HARRY Froling’s father Shane has backed the Townsville big to embrace the task of matching wits with Utah Jazz superstar Rudy Gobert in his first major challenge as an Adelaide 36er tomorrow.

After playing an influential role in Townsville Heat’s successful QBL defence, the 20year- old will come off the bench against a Jazz outfit spearheaded by Gobert, Donovan Mitchell and fellow Australian Joe Ingles in Salt Lake City.

The ultra- confident Froling, who signed his first pro- fessional contract with the 36ers for two years, after a stint in the US college system, is unlikely to take a backward step.

“Harry’s not shy, he’s a fairly confident lad as most of the Froling kids are,” Shane said.

“He’s really relishing it and everything I’ve seen from him so far is about going over there and having some fun.”

Frenchman Gobert has established himself as one of the NBA’s marquee big men, and earned NBA All- Defensive First Team honours last season.

“It’s a good opportunity for Harry. He’s standing at sixfoot- eleven and weighs 115- 120 kilos so he’s got the size to match it with him, it’s tougher skill- wise and moving him around the floor,” Shane said.

“These games gives all the NBL players a great chance to be exposed to the NBA. Watching what they ( Utah) did to Perth ( 130- 72) thrashing, they’re a pretty good team.”

Shane said Harry was working hard to win the respect of