Basketball On The Internet.

FINGERS are crossed - except for those hands clasped in prayer - Josh Bond will follow in the footsteps of Shauni Bow and Claire Kerr and make it back to fulfill his dreams.

The promising young guard is battling testicular cancer after having his US college dream dramatically cut short over the past fortnight.

And the basketball community - as it consistently does and should take humbling pride in - is rallying around the young man and his family as only a sporting community can.

Having had one surgery so far and undergoing chemotherapy in the Royal Adelaide Hospital, Josh is fighting the good fight after being rushed home from Des Moines, Iowa, where he was preparing to play college ball with the DMACC Bears.

Early into pre-season training with the Bears, Josh broke his foot and was reduced to wearing a moonboot for six weeks.

Soon after he caught bronchitis and put on a course of antibiotics.

When he was finally back in training, he hurt his back.

Fearing he had strained a muscle, he was given a course of medication which led to severe stomach pain.

"The doctor said he would have to go to hospital for more tests and that's where they found he had cancer,'' Josh's mother Lisa said.

"It is testicular cancer but it spreads from there to other parts of the body.''

Surgeons in the US were anxious to operate without delay but Josh's parents believed it would be better if his treatment and recovery were back home in Adelaide.

Qantas came to the party, flying him back in first class but by the time the plane touched down in Brisbane, Josh had taken a turn for the worse.

There was an ambulance waiting on the tarmac to ferry him to Royal Brisbane Hospital where he was kept during the day until he was sufficiently able to make the rest of the flight home.

In Adelaide, he was met on the tarmac by an ambulance and whisked straight to the Royal Adelaide Hospital.

Eight days ago and probably still jet-lagged, Josh had his first surgery.

"He had to have surgery for a brain bleed,'' Lisa said.

As news of Josh's plight spread through the sport's tight community, reactions swept swiftly from grief and disbelief to the customary roll-the-sleeves-up "what can we do?" - symptomatic of a game which is played with ferocity on the floor but generosity off it.

Basketball SA tonight and tomorrow will have collection tins at suburban stadia for its junior fixtures and his club North Adelaide is selling BOND-6 stickers for $2 each.

They will be available at Adelaide Arena tomorrow for the 36ers-Crocodiles NBL fixture and the Sixers also will wear the sticker on their warm-up tops.

Adelaide players, staff and the club are donating money to Basketball SA's Bond family collection and also donating signed merchandise to the Rockets for the SBL club's further fund-raising efforts.

"(36ers coach) Marty Clarke has been in contact and we have been overwhelmed by the support,'' Lisa said.

"With chemo, there's a 60-70 per cent chance it will clear up.

"There's just no guarantee it won't return."

Hall of Fame legend Al Green also has been in the thick of all proceedings.

It was Green who unearthed Bond as a potential player at a schools coaching clinic at Parafield Gardens years ago.

"I got him into playing basketball,'' Al said.

"He was at the clinic, he was maybe seven or eight years old and he was a left hander. Being a lefty myself, that always catches my eye.

"He already had a nice little jumpshot so I got him to come out to play for Torrens Valley, where I was coaching at the time.''

That was the start of a lifelong friendship that did not abate at all when the powerful West Adelaide club recruited Bond away from Torrens Valley's lower division opportunities.

"You know that's going to happen,'' Green said.

"He used to come to my (annual) camps as a young player. Then when he grew too old for it, he helped out at the camps.

"Matter of fact, he worked at this year's camp in January.''

But Josh's goal was to get to the US and play college basketball.

He had cracked the Bearcats' SBL team and even made a huge impression against Jacob Holmes' Sturt in the 2010 Grand Final, coming off the bench to spark West Adelaide.

An SA state junior at under-16, under-18 and under-20 levels, he was ready to move forward and crossed to North Adelaide Rockets the following season.

Green had become something of a mentor and Josh asked him to help make his decision.

"I went with him for talks with Centrals, North, Woodville and his (exit) meeting with Westies,'' Al said.

"His big dream though was to get to play college ball.''

Green had an opportunity lined up but its academic requirement was just outside Bond's reach.

"So Josh went and found another school,'' Green said.

That was DMACC, where he was welcomed with open arms and immediately embraced.

Nothing has changed.

"He is very determined to get back to DMACC,'' Lisa said.

"The coach has said he is keeping his spot open for him.

"That's really good of him and if it helps Josh by giving him a goal, then even better.''

Holmes' Townsville Crocodiles, where assistant coach Liam Flynn also knows Bond well from his years in Adelaide, have given him a signed Townsville Crocodiles uniform.

"Liam organised that," Holmes said. "This is just one of those unbelievable situations and I think we all try to do whatever we can to let him know he is in our thoughts."

The 1986 Adelaide 36ers' Invincibles coach, Ken Cole, will meet with him this week.

"Josh's plan was to attend junior college for two years, then try and move to an SEABL team, with his goal getting to the NBL,'' Lisa said.

Like Shauni Bow, a Sturt junior when she was struck down by cancer, and Claire Kerr, a Southern junior when she required a life-saving heart transplant, the basketball community has rallied en masse.

Bow beat the cancer and Kerr made it back to play under-18 Division One basketball, post-transplant.

"The Bond family doesn't have private cover,'' Green said.

"To go to the US for the surgery and what it subsequently would have cost, they would have to have sold their house and used their life savings.

"It still amazes me what South Australian people, and basketball people really, will do when one of their own is in trouble.''

Club loyalties disappear and the community rallies as one.

"From the first time I saw him with a basketball, I knew he had the touch,'' Al said.

Now let us hope he is touched by an angel and the sporting world's prayers are answered.