The Tall Ferns squad has been cut from 23 of the country's top players down to 14 and a Māori descendant with basketball in her blood has made the cut.
Trials are done, it's time now for the hard work. Megan Craig says, “We've all been feeling our aches and pains in our muscles, just trying to push through that, help each other out.”
The 6'8" Ngāpuhi descendant is impressive.
Kennedy Kereama says, “Obviously her size is a big factor. She is not only 6'8 in terms of height, she's 6'11 across with the arms, with being wide and taking a lot of room in the paint is a great thing for our team. The Australians are really tall, so you got to take those sorts of things in to consideration.”
It runs in the blood. Craig says, “I'm a cousin of Tai Wynyard and seeing him on the big stage kind of makes me proud for our family. I feel like I kind of started that and he's just continuing it on for us. We're trying to make a legacy for our younger cousins.”
She definitely knows what she wants too. Craig says, “Obviously make Rio 2016, I think from the youngest age of 12 I was like I want to go to the Olympics, I want to be on that grand stage.”
With the first game of the series kicking off in Melbourne on August 15 and the second in Tauranga on August 17, the winner will gain automatic entry to the 2016 Rio Olympics.