Boucher gets a rookie year to remember
The Breakers’ GM has survived a fiery baptism with his sanity intact, reports Marc Hinton.
When Dillon Boucher would look up from his desk at Breakers HQ and see his good friend, and head coach, Paul Henare had walked in and closed the door, a shiver would run down the spine of the first-year general manager.
‘‘What now? What next?’’ became Boucher’s default reaction to the presence of a stern-faced Henare in his office. Inevitably it meant they had another injury to deal with, and another new pathway to map out. Also that a long night lay ahead for both navigating that challenging terrain.
In a funny way it became the theme of this New Zealand Breakers season in the Australian NBL which finished at 14-14, just one win (or one Perth defeat) short of a spot in the playoffs. It was agonisingly close, with the Wildcats needing to win the final regular season game in Melbourne to tip out the Kiwis, and getting up 96-94.
For a club that had played in five of the previous six grand finals (winning four), it had to be classified a failure. Never mind that 6-2 finish, and those finalgame heroics at the NSEC against Melbourne, they fell short of their ultimate goal.
Yet Boucher, who played in the first three of those championship campaigns, refuses to grade this season so negatively. He knows all the club had to go through, with seven major injuries that either ended or curtailed players’ seasons, with the Corey Webster affair, with the incredible drama around Akil Mitchell nearly losing an eye in the name of hoops, to the final, almost incomprehensible, setback when warrior captain Mika Vukona was hospitalised with a knee infection and could not play in the must-win finale against Melbourne.
For a first-year GM and his rookie head coach, long-time team-mates, close friends and hoops tragics, this was one of those years you put down to experience and engage that maxim that what doesn’t kill you, only makes you stronger.
‘‘I anticipated there would be ups and downs but certainly not quite as many as we’ve had,’’ reflects Boucher.
‘‘The amount of obstacles we’ve had to overcome is something you’d expect in five seasons, not one.
‘‘But I love challenges and I love being challenged.
‘‘It’s been great for my growth, great for Pauli’s growth, great for the assistant coaches’ growth and great for the office team’s growth as well. It’s almost a blessing in disguise. If we are to paint a positive picture from the season it would be that everybody’s had to grow in their roles and learn on the fly with everything that’s been thrown at us.’’
Consider their catalogue of injuries: they lost Shea Ili for the first two-thirds of the season with a back stress fracture, import point guard Ben Woodside to a ruptured plantar fascia, Tall Blacks guard Corey Webster to hip, back and knee problems, replacement import David Stockton to a lower back issue, Tom Abercrombie for six weeks to a fractured hand, Mitchell to that horrific eye poke and, finally, Vukona to a knee infection. Only two Breakers (Alex Pledger and Kirk Penney) appeared in every game − an unprecedented low number. And there was also the Webster assault charges that still haven’t been heard in court.
‘‘Every time he’d walk in my office and close the door I knew there was bad news coming,’’ said Boucher of the increasingly frequent visits from Henare. ‘‘We just processed everything, looked at it holistically and made decisions on what was going to be best for the team.
‘‘The week of our last game he came in, closed the door and said ‘have you heard about Mika?’ and my heart just sunk. Our playoff life was on the line and that’s never a good first line. Then you find out Mika was in hospital. But he wasn’t freaked out. There was a calmness we had in all our meetings. Every moment was about what we needed to do to put this team in the best place to succeed.’’
The dynamic between Boucher and Henare is intriguing. Both are club greats (with their retired numbers hanging in the rafters) now entrusted with shaping the future of the organisation. Both are capable, passionate and dedicated men. Both, says Boucher, put their friendship on hold to get through what they’ve had to.
‘‘We went to the NBL awards dinner in Melbourne and roomed together for the first time since we were players. We sat back and reflected on the season and talked again as friends, and we were just really proud of each other and what we’ve done. How every time something got thrown at us, we didn’t freak out, we just dealt with it.’’
Boucher doesn’t do regrets. But if had one big lesson for the year, it came early on when he was so engrossed in the on-court team, he forgot about the group he leads in the front office.
‘‘They needed a leader too and I got a wakeup call with some feedback from the group. I realised I needed to ensure I’m putting my team in the best position to succeed as well.’’
The work never stops. He has seven pieces in place for next year already, including outstanding young prospects Finn Delany and Shea Ili, and three imports, Rob Loe and Jordan Ngatai off contract. Reviews are being done, decisions will soon roll round.
One will involve Webster. Boucher is adamant the club has been ‘‘straight up’’ about the player’s injuries and that they weren’t a smokescreen for his offcourt issues. He can’t say whether the player will return to take up a mutual option year on his contract, but indicates a decision is imminent. ‘‘Was it a distraction to the group? Absolutely it was,’’ he said of Webster’s assault charge. ‘‘But more important for us was we felt his time on the basketball court was actually hurting, not helping, the team. His injuries were affecting his performance.
‘‘He’s a fantastic player, and from what I understand now his body is good. When everything is taken into account, we will do what’s best for the team and Corey is going do what’s best for himself.’’
Just one more big decision for the GM. Close that office door.
‘‘We’ve obviously put a huge amount of time into this system, we’ve got all our settings and comms set up for that. Nothing is a given but at this stage we’re hoping we have made the right choice.’’
There has never been any question of leg-power being superior to arms. And with crew reduced from 11 to six this time, it’s seen as a logical way to squeeze more energy out of fewer people for boats that may sail as much as 20 per cent faster than in 2013 despite their smaller size.
But it’s been a matter of making it work – transferring that power from the cycles into the control systems, getting the right aerodynamics of four riders tucked into a hull and then having them get off their ‘‘bikes’’ and transfer to the other hull for turns on the catamarans that could hit 100km/h foiling on the Bermuda waters.
‘‘The boys are getting across the boat pretty well. In terms of efficiency and aerodynamics, it’s clean and tidy,’’ Ashby said of their first trials at sea.
He felt his sailors had also developed their cycling skills and power rapidly under the tutelage of Simon van Velthooven, the New Zealand track cycling star brought on board as plans started to firm a year ago.
Team New Zealand’s design coordinator Dan Bernasconi is ‘‘absolutely’’ sure the new system can give them an edge after extensive testing.