The St Mary's Gaels and their six Australian players have battled their way to the second round of the NCAA Tournament, but waiting for them is a University of Arizona squad featuring two giants, a future NBA guard and Perth's Keanu Pinder.
St Mary's defeated Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) 85-77 and Arizona crushed North Dakota 100-82 on Thursday in Salt Lake City to set up Saturday's intriguing clash in the Utah capital.
Former Geelong Grammar student Jock Landale, standing 211cm tall, has been an offensive and defensive force for St Mary's this season, while Sydney guard Emmett Naar, Hobart sharpshooter Tanner Krebs and Melbourne forward Dane Pineau have been a deadly combination.
Few expect the seventh-seeded Gaels to beat the No.2 Wildcats.
Arizona coach Sean Miller is wary.
"They really execute and shoot the basketball," Miller told reporters.
Landale had 18 points, 13 rebounds and two blocks against the small VCU line-up. The Wildcats, however, feature the elite 213cm duo of Finland's Lauri Markkanen and Serbia's Dusan Ristic.
Markannen had 20 points and 15 rebounds while Ristic collected 12 points and six rebounds against North Dakota.
St Mary's coach Randy Bennett has plenty of faith in Landale, whose size and mobility as a teenager drew the interest of the Essendon AFL team.
"Jock is a good rebounder himself and he's able to get those clean in a crowd," Bennett said.
Arizona guard Allonzo Trier is expected to enter this year's NBA Draft while their Australian, 206cm forward Pinder, is a shock weapon Miller inserts to charge up his team.
St Mary's, located near San Francisco, has a long tradition of attracting Australian players with the NBA's Matthew Dellavedova and Patty Mills alumni.
But the past three years, the Gaels failed to make the knockout tournament, which features the top-68 teams in US college basketball.
"There's no shame in losing to Saint Mary's here," VCU coach Will Wade said.
"They're a tremendous, tremendous team - both offensively and defensively."
In other round-one games on Thursday, Australian players had mixed success.
Sydney's Gorjok Gak, with two big dunks, helped power the University of Florida to a 80-65 victory over East Tennessee State.
The news was not so good for Wollongong's Xavier Cooks.
Cooks scored a game-high 23 points for South Carolina's Winthrop University in their tournament opener, but it was not enough as his team fell to Butler University 76-64.
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