Tonight in the National Arena in Tallaght, Marty Conlon will receive instruction on a rougher hewn version of "Celtic Pride". The former NBA warhorse lines out for Ireland in an historic European semi-final against Croatia.

Conlon faced Germany this week, but when he pulled on a green singlet before that he was playing for Boston in front of 20,000 Beantown hoop fans still pining for the halcyon days when the Celtics were the untouchables of the NBA. Throughout the 1990s, Conlon enjoyed the classic American journeyman pro-hoops experience, graduating from Providence and living from a suitcase; Seattle, Charlotte, Sacramento, Washington, Milwaukee, Miami and Los Angeles have all been home to the 6ft 10in centre.

The Tallaght Arena will be one of the more intimate gyms that Conlon has ever graced but his presence illustrates the vast chasm that the Irish game has leaped in recent seasons.

"Really, it was just a matter of talking to him," said Irish coach Bill Dooley.

"Marty's grandparents are all Irish and he is interested in his heritage. That he is playing in Europe now (with Greek club Maroussi) made it easier for him and we are delighted to have him along."

The appointment of Dooley, a New Jersey native and distinguished American college coach, coincided with a new direction for the Irish game. New FIBA rules afforded flexibility to those eligible to play for Ireland and thus Dooley embarked on a Jack Charltonesque trawl of the globe in search of those who "got game" - and Irish grannies.

"When I was interviewed for this post," said Dooley, "the IBA (Irish Basketball Association) made it clear that getting to the semi-finals was a priority, in order to give the team a footing and also to raise its profile. Now that we have achieved that and are getting to host the top European sides, we have to sustain it and build to try and beat them."

The Irish side has changed vastly in aspect over the past few seasons, with a distinctly US flavour to the squad; Bill Donlon is an NYC point guard who averages 25 points per game, co-captain Jay Larranaga is a 6ft 5in shooting guard from North Carolina who nailed 31 points per game for Ireland during the qualifying rounds.

Only two Irish Superleague players have made the panel; the vastly-experienced Belfast point guard Adrian Fulton and versatile Killester player Damien Sealy.

But it would be wrong to suggest that Ireland's progression in Europe has come at the cost of witch-hunting the domestic players out of contention.

Many of Ireland's young home-bred stars are now fine-tuning their game in US colleges: players such as Conor Grace and Michael Bree, who on Tuesday night captained Davidson College to a 58-54 season opening win against the University of North Carolina, an establishment of the game and Michael Jordan's alma mater. These players are the future of the Irish game.

"The one disadvantage that Irish players have is that they have full-time jobs and families as well as playing basketball. It is unrealistic to expect them to be able to devote the same time to the game as, say, US college players. But there are good players coming up in this country. The ESB programme, providing baskets in country areas, has been great. You know, you can't expect to play basketball three times a week and be any good at it. You'll reach a point but no further. It's an everyday thing and that's the way it's going to go in the future," predicts Dooley.

Unimaginable as the idea of the Croatians coming here for a serious ball game would have been just three years ago, these are still infant days for Irish basketball. This country is still light years behind the game's elite.

Dooley confesses to being a little in the dark as to how the Irish will fare in this elite level; Croatia, Cyprus and Holland might be easy pickings for Mick McCarthy's Ireland but for the domestic hoops team they represent uncharted mountains. Oh, and they have a Macedonia to contemplate also.

"We are hoping to compete well against these teams but it's a new quality of opposition for us. The loss of Dan Callahan (6ft 8in centre from Boston) due to club contracts has hurt us and we are going to have to dig deeper to compensate for that."

Still, tonight's game against the Croats is a sell-out, as was Wednesday night's semi-final phase opener against fourth-ranked Germany in Gottingen, which the Irish lost 85-77.

In the years to come, the Irish team that plays tonight may well be regarded as the pioneers. With Tullamore's Susan Moran, perhaps the most successful of all the Irish college recruits, now seen as having a realistic crack at breaking into the women's NBA and a handful of Irish players getting court time in Division One of the NCAA - the scouting ground of the NBA - the Irish game is slowly coming in from the Arctic, slowly inching towards the bright lights.

Progress will be painstakingly measured, perhaps in terms of generations rather than years, but tonight's spectacle will be heartening for the IBA. Perhaps it won't be too long before the actual Celtics follow former "green" Conlon on an exhibition back to the old country.

Ultimately, the distance between the US, where basketball has been taken close to perfection, and this raw and small but loyal outpost of the game is shrinking and will soon be little more than a bounce pass across the Atlantic.