Anchorage Daily News

With a jamed Wells Fargo Sports Complex abuzz in anticipation of the UAA Seawolves' first home playoff game since 1994, a guttural chant emanated from the tunnel leading to the locker rooms.

The louder it grew, the quieter the crowd got, and the anticipation built.

It was the Seawolves, performing a haka before taking the court, a tradition started by junior transfer Jeremiah Trueman of New Zealand.

"A few national teams did it, and my high school team did it as well," Trueman said after UAA's 80-60 win over UC San Diego on Friday. "I was wanting to see if these guys would like to do it before games. I did it for them once, and everyone seemed to like it and so we just tried it before one game, then we started rolling."

The haka is a traditional dance and chant of the Maori in New Zealand, often employed before battle to intimidate the opponent. It has been adopted by a number of athletic teams, most notably the All Blacks rugby team.

That it is now an integral part of the Seawolves' pregame ritual reflects the team's international flavor -- Luke Cooper and Kevin White are Australian, Trueman is from New Zealand.

"Every Australia versus New Zealand match, whether it's rugby or basketball, the New Zealanders try to scare us, but it doesn't work," Cooper said.

Trueman -- nicknamed Kiwi -- first showcased the haka at a team-building session at assistant coach Shane Rinner's house.

"I was trying to tell the guys something about myself, so I just got up there and did it," Trueman said. "(It) kind of blew them away a little bit. I was pretty excited to do it."

Trueman's teammates bought into the idea of performing a haka before games. On the Seawolves' trip to Hawaii the week before Christmas, they made use of their down time to practice the haka, with Kiwi leading it in the middle.

That was the early stages of what would become a school- and conference-record 18-game winning streak.

Coincidence? Not according to Cooper.

"I'm a bit superstitious, so I made sure we did it before every game," he said. "I believe that's the reason we're winning so many games.

"It means a lot to Kiwi to do it, so we help him out and get into it. It fires us up a bit. You see Kiwi in the middle and the face he's got on, it gets the blood pumping and the adrenalin flowing. It's good to get a fire under our bellies."

The team huddles together, sways back and forth in rhythm and chants the words, getting louder and louder until a climactic bellow.

It gets the players fired up -- and the crowd, too. The sold out gym exploded in applause when the Seawolves broke the huddle and took the court.

"It's a challenge to the other team and it stirs something inside of you up to play harder," Trueman said. "There's more spark in the air the last three minutes of warm-ups.

"They picked it up pretty well. It's something special (to me) that all the guys bought into it."

And what exactly do the Seawolves say during the haka?

"No idea," Cooper said. "I basically just yell words that sound like the words that he's saying. If you're just yelling and doing the right hand signals you look like you know what you're doing."

These days the Seawolves are doing much more than going through the motions on the basketball court. Their record-setting season is still rolling into the semifinals of the Western Regional.

And when they get ready to take the court to play Seattle Pacific tonight, you can bet your last dollar -- American or New Zealand -- that everyone in the Wells Fargo Sports Complex will know when it's game time.

Find Andrew Hinkelman online at adn.com/contact/ahinkelman or call 257-4335.

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