Bay Area Dragons coach Brian Goorjian has had a storied career: Olympic bronze medal, six Australian NBL championships, six-time NBL coach of the year. It's not often he faces a coach with credentials to match his.
Goorjian on Sunday will lead the undefeated Dragons against Tim Cone's Barangay Ginebra -- the PBA's most successful coach at the helm of the league's most popular team.
"It's worldwide," Goorjian said of Cone's reputation. "Even when I was in Australia and I went to the (NBA) Summer League and he was around Miami, the reputation he's built, you hear all through Asia, all through the United States, he's just a very well-respected man as a coach, as a person and as a developer of talent.
"So as a coach it's fantastic to get the opportunity to play against a team like that and a coach like that.
"But from our side, the staff, everybody, nothing but respect for what he's done here and what he does with his team. And we know that they're the fan favorites, so it should be a great atmosphere and we just hope we can make this a contest."
The Dragons are coming into the matchup with Ginebra following a win over the Converge FiberXers to go 4-0 in the PBA Commissioner's Cup.
The two coaches have never met, and earlier this week Cone said he hopes to sit down with Goorjian one day and just talk basketball. Goorjian said he looks forward to that day as well.
"We all feel the same and again, that's part of this whole thing," Goorjian said.
"I keep stressing, I know I'm the national coach of Australia and I've had some success, but this is a huge learning experience for me. It's a different basketball than I've played in the NBL. It's a different basketball than I've played in China.
"It's learning new (things). And I hope again that we bring that to the table as well. We play a little bit different than the teams here, and maybe we can bring in an element that they can learn as well. Sharing knowledge with Tim, Tab Baldwin, coaches like tonight (Aldin Ayo), it's exciting for me."
For the Ginebra game, Bay Area will be fielding in big man Andrew Nicholson as its import for the first time in lieu of high-scoring guard Myles Powell. It was a quirk the league allowed after disallowing the Dragons from using both imports at the same time. The team's offense, Goorjian says, will have a different look.
"Obviously he (Nicholson) is an interior player. So offensively we'll be throwing it inside a little bit more than we have. And I think with Myles, it puts a lot of pressure on our bigs. But now players like Kobe Lam and some of our bench guys will become much more important when you take a guy like Myles out of it."