'Un-Finnish-ed business': Petteri's NZ perspective

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Petteri Koponen battled a horror schedule, injuries, suspensions and is own club pulling against him to start his coaching career, but held his head high and can't wait to begin a new era with the New Zealand Breakers.

Just think about it. Koponen, 37, had just finished his career as an all-time great of Finnish basketball and his first coaching job was on the other side of the world with a Breakers team with management seemingly sabotaging any chance of success.

"It was a great learning experience that first season and it wasn’t always easy, but what is?" Koponen told basketball.com.au.

"If you want to be good you have to get those challenges and sufferings, and it only makes you better in the long run. You hope even though yeah, it was tough of course.

"As a coach, it was my first experience and it was totally different to when you were a player and let's say it wasn’t bad for my family to not be there because I was working constantly the whole time.

"You're always thinking that if you watch one more game or one more clip it might change everything, but in reality it doesn’t work that way. But basically when I was alone, it was only basketball and I was just trying to turn over every stone to see what could help.

"It was mentally tough of course not having my family there, but it's a great learning experience and that's always the goal to try and get one per cent every day as a player or a coach to get the prize in the end."

Koponen had the Breakers firing at 7-3 going into the FIBA break before the decision was made to blow up everything with Tacko Fall replacing Freddie Gillespie, and they only won three more games.

Parker Jackson-Cartwright was injured and suspended along the way, the team had precious little practice time to completely change their game style with Fall's integration, and Koponen was still trying to figure things out as a coach and in a totally new league to him.

The personnel change wasn’t something he had any say in, but he conducted himself admirably the whole way through while on the other side of the world from his wife and their 10, seven and one-year-old sons most of NBL25.

It's hard to imagine any coach could ever have more thrown at him in a rookie season which is why Koponen takes a positive approach upon reflection.

Reflecting on dramatic NBL25

Right from the start, it was always going to be a challenge for Koponen to take on his first coaching job in a league totally foreign to him but that's when the barriers were put in his way.

The NBLxNBA experiment might have benefits, but in terms of trying to keep your NBL season on track it has proven challenging for all competing teams. For the Breakers this time around, it meant that they travelled more than 51,000km in the space of six weeks.

Then not only did they continually have to play road games in Australia, even home games meant they had to travel to several of them in Christchurch and New Plymouth.

The Fall experiment might have worked had he joined the team in pre-season. But by him coming in mid-season and changing everything the Breakers had development to win seven of the first 10 games was never going to work.

Throw that in with the run of injuries they had all throughout the season then Jackson-Cartwright was suspended and got hurt, and none of what made the whole season challenging was within Koponen's control.

"Let's say, it was a great experience from a coaching perspective," Koponen said.

"You really had to think about all the things throughout the season and how we can help the guys more, what we can do and is there something we can still try to do with the limited practice time.

"It was a great coaching clinic also for me to try and do all these kind of things in a little time. Let's say, it was hard during the season but now looking back, it was really OK and it made me, and us as a coaching staff, use our time every day to try and get the best out of the group.

"It wasn’t always easy, it was challenging, but that's what you need to get better. At least I really feel that we did everything to try and get better, and to get the team on the same page.

"It wasn’t an easy thing for any of us because we played with two different systems completely throughout the last part of the season so it was challenging and some players picked things up faster, some not.

"Overall it was a great learning experience at least for all of us and especially me as the coach."

Management seemingly working against team

Whether it was the decision to be part of the NBLxNBA tour, bringing in Fall, playing 'home' games on the road or any number of calls made, the previous Breakers ownership and management group didn’t give the team the best chance to succeed.

While Koponen would have never said anything at the time, but with new owners and management, he does feel much better that the whole club is heading in the right direction.

When he looks back on all the events of a remarkably dramatic NBL25, he can reflect on knowing that it's hard to imagine he'll have a tougher season as a coach than that first one.

"It wasn't easy, but at the same time but in the end we realised it's part of the business I guess," Koponen said.

"You have to try to then make the best out of the situation and of course, it meant we had to change many things offensive, defensively and the hardest part I think was the mental part obviously for the group.

"They worked really well together in the pre-season, they were enjoying each other's company and that's not something you can take for granted. You never know how the team will gel and how they click together, and how they work as a group.

"The guys found that chemistry and that's really important especially when you're winning and then there was the change in the roster.

"That shakes things up and then you start losing, it takes the air out of the group and that was the toughest part, the mental part. We tried everything to win these games, but that mental part for the guys was the tough one."

Big tick that PJC wanted to return

Clearly the player impacted the most from the decision to bring in Fall mid-season, aside from Gillespie who he replaced, was Jackson-Cartwright.

He was the leading MVP candidate at the time with his great strength as an explosive guard was getting into the paint and either finishing in traffic or getting to the foul line.

Suddenly, now when he attempted that he had his own 7'6 teammate in the way and things just never clicked the rest of the way and it always seemed that the pair wouldn’t be together for NBL26.

In the end, it's Jackson-Cartwright returning and Koponen is delighted in the tick of approval that gives the new management to have him want to return.

"With Tacko and Parker, as a basketball couple I don’t think they are the best match let's say but now it's passed us and with the new management we really said that we wanted to keep Parker because that continuity is important," Koponen said.

"He loves the city and the country, and the fans, and he likes to be with us so we wanted to make it happen. We had the conversations and management really pushed for him and I'm really happy that he's coming back.

"We had a great relationship as a person and player, and he's a really important piece for us. I'm really looking forward to working with him again and I'm really excited to get him back."

Breakers rediscovering NZ identity

It's a new era at the Breakers under a new ownership group headed up by Kiwi-American businessman Marc Mitchell along with New Zealanders Leon and Stephen Grice, Sean Colgan, and former owners Paul and Liz Blackwell.

Former Breakers greats Tom Abercrombie and Dillon Boucher have joined the front office too and the clear focus of getting back to that championship winning Breakers identity starting as simply as returning to the black colours, and then reconnecting with that New Zealand culture.

That's exciting for Koponen because from the second he signed up to coach the Breakers he knew how import it was for the club to be New Zealand's pride and joy in terms of a basketball team.

"I said this from the first day that the goal of the club has to be to connect with all of New Zealand," Koponen said.

"You just watch what they did at the Under-19 World Cup and the future is looking bright, but it has to be the goal of the club that all the young Kiwi players want to one day be a Breaker.

"That should be the big goal for the club. It should be the face of New Zealand basketball and at one point every Kiwi player should be really keen to put that Breakers jersey on, and I think that's the vision for the new management.

"I agree with that totally. It's a small country and it's great to have that kind of club in the NBL to represent them, and it should be a club that all young Kiwi dreams of playing for one day."

Looking ahead now to second season

Part of reconnecting with the New Zealand community for the Breakers is having a largely Kiwi playing group and that's seen Reuben Te Rangi, Izayah Le'afa, Rob Loe and Taylor Britt all return.

Fellow New Zealanders Carlin Davison, Kaia Isaac, Max Darling and Sam Mennenga have been returned so aside from the three imports, Next Star Karim Lopez and Australian Sean Bairstow, it's a local roster.

The two pieces still to be added are the two imports alongside Jackson-Cartwright. That's where Koponen's focus is right while he enjoys some family time back in Finland before coming back to Auckland in early August.

"You understand better the challenges ahead of us and all these things so it's easier to put things in perspective and get to work every day to get ready for the season.

"At the same time, we are still missing two pieces and we're trying to find two good imports next to Parker and then our team is set, and it's time to get to work.

"Still, the first part is trying to do a good job there because Tuomas Iisalo, who is now the head coach of Memphis Grizzlies, once told me that it's hard to out-coach bad recruiting.

"So it's really important we get these decisions right and we're going to Vegas (NBA Summer League) and have a few names, and we'll see who we finish the team off with, but I'm really excited for the second year.

"We've got a good group so far and the goal is to have that key Kiwi core who enjoy playing together, and that chemistry will be key for us."