Listen
The head of the New Zealand Breakers basketball franchise says he doesn't see its troubled star player playing for the team again.
Glen Rice Jr Photo: Photosport
Glen Anthony Rice Jr will appear in an Auckland court tomorrow on assault charges following an incident in the city last week.
He apologised on Monday for the altercation at a club on Fort Lane in Auckland where he was arrested and charged.
The former Washington Wizards player was charged in the USA with reckless conduct in 2015 and arrested for battery and robbery in 2016.
The Breakers chief executive and owner Matt Walsh said it was a calculated risk to sign Rice and he had been read the riot act.
"I think it's very unlikely he plays again for the Breakers but in the meantime, we are going to get him help," he said.
He said the legal process had to play out but Rice's days at the Breakers were definitely numbered.
"We set up some structures in place that we believed would help Glen ultimately and help him be successful here and unfortunately, and I take responsibility for this, it just didn't work."
Matt Walsh Photo: PHOTOSPORT
But Wellington Saints owner Nick Mills said Walsh knew what he was in for and should be helping the troubled star more.
"What I don't understand about the Breakers, and I thought it was a fabulous decision - he's a great player and he would have made a great difference to the team if he did play some more games - but they cut him at his first little hurdle," Mills said.
"If you are going to take a wounded animal into your home, you can't just cut them on the first mistake, you've got to work them through and educate them."
Rice had informed the Breakers of the incident ahead of the weekend game in Perth, but still travelled with the team and was set to play until the NBL made the call to bench him.
Walsh said the club followed protocol and worked with the NBL on the decision.
It is not the only problem facing the club.
It had to sanction Tom Vodanovich for his antics on the flight home from Perth, with police waiting at Auckland Airport to deal with the player, who said he took a sleeping pill in conjunction with alcohol.
Tom Vodanovich Photo: PHOTOSPORT
Walsh initially said he would "come down hard" on the player but today he struck a different tone.
"Tom's a great guy, he's a great team guy, he's one of our locker room leaders," he said.
"He messed up, he took a sleeping pill and had some wine and had a reaction, but just because we've got some other stuff going on we're not going to overreact and come down super hard on Tom."
Walsh has courted controversy himself this year, earning a $5000 fine from the NBL for a verbal altercation with an official.
He said he'd also taken the rap for that but rejected that the Breakers were a far cry from the family-friendly club run by Liz and Paul Blackwell - who sold him the franchise last year.
"There's a reason the Blackwells wanted to sell, it wasn't a sustainable business, and what they were doing, they weren't going to do anymore, there wasn't going to be a Breakers," he said.
"They had the team on the market, and no New Zealander wanted to buy it, so it was not a successful organisation off the court."
Mills said the Breakers did have to take stock or they could slide down the ladder.
"I also have another great famous saying in sport which is 'momentum is a mother-something' starting with a very naughty word," he said.
"When your momentum is going backwards and all over the place you seem to get into a real hole, and that's where they are now and they've got to stop the slide and get it right very quickly."
The Breakers are down in the doldrums on the ladder, sitting on second to last having won just two from nine games. If they stay there, it will be their worst season in seven years.
Walsh said on-court success wasn't far away and while he was likely to break up with Rice, he said fans should stick with the Breakers.