Thursday, 8 August 2019:
 | | Head coach ANDREW GAZE of the Sydney Kings looks on during their game against the Utah Jazz at Vivint Smart Home Arena in Salt Lake City, Utah. | |
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In a team stacked with NBA experience, Boomers great Andrew Gaze can see one of the freshest faces making the biggest World Cup statement.
NBA title winners Andrew Bogut, Patty Mills, Aron Baynes and Matthew Dellavedova, along with Utah Jazz starter Joe Ingles, will provide a core capable of earning a maiden international medal in China next month.
They will begin preparations with double headers against both Canada and the United States before the tournament begins on August 31.
Five-time Olympian Gaze expects Philadelphia 76ers power forward Jonah Bolden to emerge as a key ingredient of the charge in what will be the 23-year-old's senior Boomers debut.
Melbourne native Bolden impressed in his first NBA season alongside compatriot Ben Simmons in Philadelphia this year, and Gaze can see him thriving in China despite missing the Boomers' entire qualification campaign.
"As a stretch four, really athletic with great basketball IQ I think he can be that guy that announces himself," Gaze said.
"It's an outstanding squad (coach) Andrej (Lemanis) has picked. He obviously has a style he wants to play and I think Jonah really fits that."
Gaze admitted he was surprised to see 2016 Olympian Brock Motum left out of the final 12 but said in Bogut, Baynes, Jock Landale, Nicholas Kay and Xavier Cooks they have all bases covered.
"I can see Jock playing in the same unit as Andrew Bogut because he has improved his mobility so much, he can transition and be that big body at both ends of the floor," he said.
"With so much quality, Andrej was always going to have to make some really tough decisions."
Landale, who played in Serbia last season for Partizan, turned heads with his NBA Summer League form to demand selection in the final 12.
"I had a pretty tough year out in Serbia and wasn't sure where I stood in this whole deal because I know that we have a lot of very talented big men," he said.
"It could have gone one of 100 ways. When these guys broke the news to me it was pretty special."
Lemanis said the side's clear "mission" was to return with a gold medal and Gaze agreed the tournament presented as one of their best chances to break the hoodoo.
"They have to play to their ability (to win), but their ability is through the roof," Gaze said.
"It's a tough draw they're in (with Canada, Lithuania and Senegal) though; I'd say they're the favourites (to top it), but not by much."
