YANNICK Crowder is an American basketballer who was named after a French tennis player — and now he's trying his hand at Australian football.

The 22-year-old, whose mother was a big fan of Yannick Noah in the 1980s, finished his college basketball career in March and seven months later finds himself at the NAB AFL Draft Combine at Etihad Stadium in Melbourne.

That's Melbourne in Victoria as opposed to Melbourne in Florida, the state in which he was based during his college sports career.

If Crowder tests well at this week's draft combine, an AFL club could put him on its list as a development rookie. He could well be playing AFL football next season.

"I love it," Crowder said of the Australian game.

"It's the competitiveness. It's the physicality of it."

Crowder grew up in Stone Mountain, on the outskirts of Atlanta, the largest city in America's south.

After finishing school, he accepted a scholarship at Florida A&M (Agricultural and Mechanical) University in Tallahassee, where he studied business administration.

The US college sports system is the level below professional sport. Players are drafted out of the college system to go into the professional competitions, which in basketball's case is the National Basketball Association.

The National Collegiate Athletic Association is the organisation that runs college sport. Florida A&M plays basketball in the NCAA's division one, meaning the level immediately below the NBA.

Crowder, who's 201cm and 98kg, could have registered for the NBA draft but instead decided to play professional basketball in Europe.

He was all set to head across the Atlantic when he received an email from his basketball coach in Florida, who'd passed on an email he'd received about prospective Australian footballers.

 Crowder is unsure how the email reached his basketball coach in the first place. It was asking whether he was interested in going to the AFL combine.

"He sent me an email about this combine. I thought it was spam," Crowder said.

"I thought, 'What it this? I've never head of this."

His agent did his due diligence on the combine.

"My agent said, 'This is for real. You should go for it, man. You don’t have anything to lose'."

Since being asked to come to Australia for further testing, Crowder has taken a keen interest in the game.

This interest was heightened when he went to his first AFL match, the Grand Final between the Sydney Swans and Hawthorn at the MCG on Saturday.

"I never experienced anything like that in my life — hands down," he said.

"I felt the energy in the air — it was electric, it was amazing. I'd never seen that many people in one area go that crazy.

"It's something I'd never seen before."

When asked whether there were any players who caught his eye, he named two.

"Buddy Franklin — he's a freak of nature. He basically just put his hand up in the air, they'd kick it to him, and he pretty much got it.

"He was unstoppable out there — kind of similar to (NBA basketballer) LeBron James in that he carried his team.

"Also one guy from the Sydney Swans — Teddy (Richards). I liked Teddy a lot. He was much smaller than Buddy, but Teddy never gave up.

"No matter how many times Buddy went over him Teddy got back up and went back at him.

"Late in the game he actually defended Buddy really well. He came through when the team needed him, so big ups to Teddy.

"I'm a real fan of Teddy."

When asked to name his NBA heroes, he also named two. One was the obvious choice, Miami Heat star James, who's the best player in the world.

"He's an athlete," Crowder said. "He gets everything done.

"He can score, rebound, assist. He does it all."

The other choice is Tyson Chandler, a New York Knicks star who shares the qualities shown by Richards in the Grand Final.

"I like him for the fact that he gives everything he has," Crowder said.

"I never really see him in the court complaining about anything. He just goes out there and gets it done.

"He doesn't get the credit for doing the dirty work.

"And that kind of describes me. I love doing the dirty work — setting a screen or getting a rebound or making the extra effort to save a play.

"Just the little things that don't show up on a stat sheet but mean a lot to the team."

There are 10 international prospects at the combine, from countries as diverse as Papua New Guinea, Ireland, New Zealand and the US.

Each club has the capacity to list one Irish player as well as three other internationals on their rookie list for development players.

Development-list players are not counted on the senior and rookie lists. This gives clubs room to take a punt on untried players.

Crowder is just one player with a chance of forging an unlikely dream.