The Tall Blacks' hopes of playing at the 2012 Olympics have taken a major hit after their 84-62 loss to Macedonia in their opening game of the qualifying tournament in Venezuela.
The Tall Blacks failed to recover from a slow start after going into the second quarter down 26-11. Macedonia took a 43-29 lead into halftime and led 60-48 at the end of the third quarter.
Veteran forward Casey Frank, who had five points and eight rebounds, said the fast start by Macedonia gave the Europeans confidence to take control of the game.
"We didn't have the aggressiveness from the start and once they got off to a good start ... that gave them a lot of confidence," he said.
The Tall Blacks turned over the ball 21 times and shot just 35 per cent from the field.
"Our shooting let us down," Frank said. "When you shoot that poor a percentage it's always going to be difficult."
Nenad Vicinic's side will need to beat African champions Angola tomorrow morning (NZT) to have any chance of progressing to the quarter-finals of the 12-team tournament. They must finish in the top three to earn a ticket to London.
Making their task more difficult, the Tall Blacks face Angola after a 16-hour turnaround. Angola meanwhile will have a full day's rest behind them.
"Obviously it's more difficult but it's the Olympic dream. We're certainly not going to give up on ourselves," Frank added.
"We go into that game full of confidence. It's going to be difficult. We took a shot to the jaw today but we'll have to quickly recover as we play again within 24 hours."
"We're going to have to dig down deep and find a way to get it done."
Alex Pledger top scored for New Zealand with 11 points and 11 rebounds. Lester McCalebb led the way for Macedonia with 23 points and 11 assists.
The Tall Blacks have appeared at the Olympics twice, in 2000 and 2004.
