Motivated Vukona back for Tall Blacks
Mika Vukona has waited 12 long years for this shot at redemption, and he is not about to let it pass without giving it everything he has in his deep reservoir of effort.
Vukona was named yesterday as captain of Paul Henare’s Tall Blacks squad of 12 to head to the Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast – the strongest possible collection of hoops talent not plying their trade in Europe or the US (and thus unavailable).
At 35, Vukona understands he is now in the golden years of his hoops career. He has a season or two as a fully fledged pro left. But the hard-nosed Breakers power forward has some goals he’d still like to achieve, at the top of which is getting to the Tokyo Olympics.
He will tick another one of them off by heading back for basketball’s second appearance on the Commonwealth Games sports list.
You see, Vukona was part of the Tall Blacks team that headed to the last Games, in Melbourne in 2006, and played a minor part in an epic final between Tab Baldwin’s New Zealand men and the Australian Boomers for the gold medal.
The Tall Blacks led by eight at
one stage in the third term, and
62-61 at the final break, but were pipped in a thrilling finish that saw the Aussies get up 81-76 on the back of a couple of back-breaking three-pointers by Jason Smith.
‘‘I was a young chicken back then,’’ recalled Vukona yesterday. ‘‘That final was crazy. It was at Hisense Arena, there were
10-11,000 people in there, and it was rocking. It came down to the last shot really.’’
‘‘It was devastating to come so close to a gold medal and lose it.’’
That group included many of the icons of the New Zealand game who had been part of an unprecedented wave of international success through the early 2000s, among them Pero Cameron and Paul Henare, who now head the Tall Blacks coaching setup.
Vukona has every confidence this group, including seven of his Breakers team-mates, can give the gold medal an equally good lash in Queensland, and maybe even go one better than that 2006 group.
‘‘This group here is amazing, and just watching from afar [he has sat out recent Fiba Asia world cup qualifying games] I’m pretty excited to jump back in. These guys have grown so much since that Asia Cup last year, and to see them continue in the Fiba Asia windows, I’m chomping at the bit just to be part of this crew. ‘‘It’s a big honour for me.’’
It is also another shot at the Aussies, no longer an annual fixture now they’re immersed in the wider world of Fiba’s Asia zone.
Vukona is adamant Andrej Lemanis’ strong group of Australia-based Boomers can be beaten when it really matters, even if they’re yet to have their colours lowered since coming into the Asia zone.
‘‘With a lot of these guys playing in the [Australian] NBL, we’ve seen all their players. There’s no unknown, no fear factor. But we’ve got to worry about everyone in our pool which is tough. Nigeria and Canada are not going to be any slouches, and have great pedigree in terms of their programmes.’’
Vukona says the unique experience of being part of the wider Games team will be something to savour for his young team-mates, but he will also be reminding them of one important thing.
‘‘It’s a teaser, because the real goal is trying to get to the Olympics. This is a great taste, and hopefully it fuels these guys to continue the process they’ve started already.’’
Henare liked the mix of youth and experience in a side shorn of Europe-based pros Corey and Tai Webster and Isaac Fotu.
‘‘Mika, Tom [Abercrombie], JK [Jarrod Kenny], Pledge [Alex Pledger] and Rob [Loe] are the old heads in this group, but there is no expectation on them doing anything other than just be themselves, and be leaders in how they behave and play.’’
The Tall Blacks have been drawn in a top-seeded pool A alongside the hosts, Nigeria and Canada, with India, Cameroon, India and Scotland comprising the lower ranked pool B. The top two in pool A will advance straight to the semifinals, with the next two playing off against the leading pair from pool B for the remaining two spots.