LAKE FOREST, Ill. -- Growing up in rugby-crazed New Zealand, Paul Lasike dreamed one day of sharing a stadium with the country's powerhouse national team, the All Blacks.
"In New Zealand, man, the All Blacks -- that's the team," Lasike said. "You see those guys on buses, on the television news, at the train stations -- you see their pictures everywhere. They are the idols that everyone looks up to."
Lasike, 26, finally gets to fulfill his lifelong quest, albeit in roundabout fashion, when the All Blacks travel to Chicago for a match versus Ireland on Saturday.