Tall Blacks have spring in their step
Two in-form NBA studs, an imposing 5-1 pool record, the No 4 world ranking and some lights-out shooting percentages here in Spain. The Tall Blacks have the lethal Lithuanians right where they want them.
There's a theory doing the rounds ahead of tomorrow morning's (NZ time) round of 16 knockout game at the basketball World Cup that playing a team of Lithuania's calibre will bring the best out in Nenad Vucinic's New Zealand side.
It had better do, for the Tall Blacks need to find a level that, frankly, they managed only in patches during their five Group C games in Bilbao where they finished 2-3 to sneak into the knockout round as fourth qualifier.
The New Zealanders played a quality half and a-bit against the Turks, had it going for a similar period against the Finns and were pretty solid for the whole 40 in their best performance of the tournament, a 73-61 victory over the Ukraine.
But they had a shocker against the Dominican Republic, were always playing for pride alone against the US and had a bad case of the wobbles in the finishing straight against both Turkey and Finland.
The normally reliable Kirk Penney is yet to find anything resembling his best form - he's shooting 32 per cent from the floor and just 27 from beyond the arc - and his average of 11.8 points a game is under half of his stellar effort from four years ago. You could say he's due.
Corey Webster has also been a little up and down - 38 per cent shooting and 30 from deep for 11.2 a game - and a hobbled Tom Abercrombie (7.6 points and 3.8 rebounds) has gone nowhere near to making the same impact as he did in Turkey four years ago.
For all that, here the Tall Blacks are in the top 16 for the fourth straight global tournament, and in with a sniff of the top eight if they can dig deep and find the consistency that's eluded them thus far.
You wouldn't put it past them. They went toe to toe with a succession of European heavyweights - Lithuania included -before this tournament, and in their pool opener it was only a freakish series of events that let world No 7 Turkey off the hook.
The top teams do tend to bring out the best in this band of Kiwi scrappers, and there's no doubt their style is a little unsettling. Coach after coach through pool play talked about how difficult it is to defend the motion offence when it's on point and dragging opposing big men away from hoop protection.
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Tall Blacks have spring in their step