US basketball coach turned Tall Blacks into a team capable of beating Australia
You’ve probably achieved something in life when six different pallbearers carry your coffin out of your funeral from the six who carried it in. Such was the respect in which former Tall Blacks basketball coach Steve McKean was held at his funeral in his home town of New Plymouth last week, after his death from cancer aged 77.
McKean’s coffin was taken into the TSB Stadium by former Tall Blacks Stan Hill, Judge John MacDonald, John Rademakers, Byron Vaetoe, New Zealand-domiciled American player Benny Anthony, and excoach John Dybvig. (McKean had typically selected an exceptionally balanced and talented starting five with
MacDonald point guard, Rademakers shooting guard, Vaetoe small forward, Anthony power forward and Hill centre with the controversial Dybvig ensuring nothing would ever be dull on the bench.)
That was matched by the prominent Taranaki personalities with whom he became firm friends across sport and business during some 25 years living in the region: Ken Maharey (ex-Taranaki rugby coach/ business), Warren Osbourne (ex-Mountain Airs NBL coach/business), Bruce Sutton (rugby coach), Garry Carnachan (NZ schools sport), Mark Bowden (education), Phil Quinney (broadcasting). Another, noted Kiwi rugby league international Howie Tamati, delivered one of the eulogies.
They all loved McKean as much for his passion for sport and his attitude to it. An American flag and a basketball hoop were on the wall in pride of place for the service, which was livestreamed to McKean’s family in Minnesota.
In an emotional and humorous service, McKean was remembered as a master of the one-liner, larger than life, wonderfully loud and a charismatic character. His ability to make every player feel like a star and his relationship-building were attributes mentioned more than once, the Taranaki Daily News reported.
McKean started his New Zealand basketball career in Auckland after arriving here from the US 50 years ago in 1971. He was persuaded to come to New Zealand by his lifelong buddy and San Jose University teammate Bob South, who later became a journalist on the Auckland Star.
‘‘I did have to check first that they spoke English,’’ quipped McKean before he and South became the first of what was initially a trickle, then a stream of imports as the National Basketball League (NBL) in New Zealand began in the early 1980s.
But McKean, whose own playing career was hobbled by bad ankles, soon made his mark coaching and was swiftly installed as the New Zealand men’s coach in 1972. He succeeded John Hinton, whose ability to strategise the game was being constantly questioned. But what a hospital pass.
The sport was largely in its infancy here, and McKean had the unenviable task of having little funding for often disjointed programmes yet was expected to produce a team capable of beating big brother Australia as Oceania’s qualifer for the Olympics and world championships.
McKean set about getting the best players with him, notably Hill for whom he helped arrange a basketball scholarship at San Jose, and MacDonald, the country’s superior guard. Knitted around this duo was a group of capable players willing to play their hearts out for their coach. And the supposedly unachievable was attained once in 1978 during McKean’s tenure.
The basketball boilover occurred when John Hill (Stan’s younger brother) tipped the ball in on the last second for the breakthrough first win over the Boomers at Lower Hutt and locked that series at 1-1. It created the ‘‘thriller for Manila’’, as the decider was dubbed, with a ticket to the world tournament in the Philippines at stake. The hard-fought third test in Christchurch was narrowly lost but not before several questionable calls from Australian referee John Holden.
McKean was initially nicknamed Bomber for his uncanny ability to hit long-range shots. Even in the early 1980s he could still outshoot Tall Blacks players from a stand.
McKean was an NBL coach for nine years, during which time he coached the first team in the NBL to win 100 games. In the late-1980s he shifted from Auckland to guide the Taranaki team in the NBL and happily settled there with wife Rachel and daughter Naomi. McKean received the Basketball New Zealand (BBNZ) coach of the year award in both 1978 and again in 2002.
He was awarded the New Zealand Order of Merit in 2012 for services to sport. In 2016 McKean was honoured by the wider sports sector when presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the New Zealand Sport and Recreation Awards and inducted into the BBNZ hall of fame.
He later became a long-serving director of Sport Taranaki and secondary school sports co-ordinator. –