Retiring Breakers guard Paul Henare says the side always believed they could win the Australian basketball league.
The newly crowned champions took out grand final game three on Friday night in Auckland by 18 points over the Cairns Taipans to become the first New Zealand side to win a senior Australian competition.
Henare says the Breakers recruited well and that's helped them get through tough times, even when Kirk Penney was trying out for the NBA early on in the season.
Henare moves home to Napier, where he'll be coaching Hawkes Bay in the local NBL, but the future of the Breakers' American imports Gary Wilkinson and Kevin Braswell remains up in the air.
Breakers coach Andrej Lemanis says they'd love to keep the pair because if you find good Americans they're worth hanging onto and it's a gamble with new guys.
