OPINION: When Dillon Boucher retired as a Tall Blacks player in 2008, then-coach Nenad Vucinic was desperate to make him his assistant.

It was an Olympic year and Boucher had never coached a game in his life, so Basketball NZ wasn't ready to promote him without spending time on the pathway.

But Vucinic knew what Boucher was capable of - he knew that if basketball didn't grab him immediately, someone else would and he might be lost forever.

So Boucher was eased through the side door as 'video analyst' - which was how he broke onto the Tall Blacks playing roster in the first place - and his offcourt potential was recognised by the NZ Breakers, who eventually made him their general manager.

This week, Boucher walked away from that role with nothing else lined up.

If you have four kids, you don't quit your job without knowing what your next move will be, unless your position has become absolutely untenable.

But that seems to be how the Breakers roll these days.

The Aussie NBL organisation established to help foster basketball in New Zealand, off the back of the Tall Blacks' breakout 2002 world championship performance, has systematically separated itself from its roots, since new ownership took over last year.

First, coach and foundation player Paul Henare was let loose. Then, captain and club icon Mika Vukona was gone, along with many of the homegrown players and staff that had helped the Breakers to titles over recent years.

Ownership hired rookie coach Kevin Braswell - who also played on a champion Breakers team - to replace Henare, but couldn't dump him fast enough, after his first campaign fell short of the playoffs.

Fourteen years ago, the Breakers persevered with another rookie coach - Aussie Andre Lemanis - through two seasons and a combined 18-win/46-loss record, before he finally made the post-season and, ultimately, rewarded that faith with three straight championships.