Five years after practically ripping the America's Cup out of Dennis Conner's hands, a methodical, low-key crew of New Zealand sailors aboard Black Magic will defend yachting's biggest prize against Italy's Luna Rossa, backed by the powerful Prada design house, starting Saturday (Friday night in the U.S.).

If Italy wins the best-of-9 series, the oldest trophy in sports will sail back to Europe for the first time in 149 years. If the Kiwis win, it stays in the City of Sails -- where everyone, it seems, has a boat. And it would be the first time a non-U.S. team has successfully defended it.

These days, though, it's not nearly as easy to keep the Auld Mug bolted down like it was for the 132 years it belonged to the New York Yacht Club.

In the last 17 years, the Cup has been to Perth, Australia, to San Diego and then Auckland, the biggest city in the smallest nation to ever own it.

Auckland is ready to cheer on its heroes. There's also a sense of anticipation, because as Luna Rossa survived attrition and demolition in the four-month, 11-team challenger trials, Team New Zealand was off by itself, testing its boats and sailing intrasquad races.

Downtown's Viaduct Basin, a collection of wharves, shops, sidewalk cafes and apartments, will be packed as the sleek, 75-foot carbon-fiber yachts are towed out into the Hauraki Gulf's shifty, confounding winds.

An enormous spectator fleet will watch as Black Magic and Luna Rossa chase each other around the windward-leeward course three times for a total of 18.5 miles.

Could a similar scene unfold three years from now on the Mediterranean?

That's the alluring storyline of the 30th America's Cup.

That's why Prada chief and sailing enthusiast Patrizio Bertelli is spending an estimated $60 million on Italy's campaign. He named Luna Rossa for the red moon he saw one night over Punta Ala, on the Tuscany coast, figuring it was a poetic-romantic contrast to the vexing Black Magic.

The Cup hasn't been in European hands since 1851, when the schooner America claimed it after beating a fleet of English ships around the Isle of Wight.

That's what drives 15 Italians and one Brazilian aboard Luna Rossa, a silver-and-red bullet of a boat that won the dramatic Louis Vuitton Cup finals against San Francisco's AmericaOne, assuring that for the first time ever, an American boat won't sail in the America's Cup.

"The more this sport is spread around, the better it is," said Luna Rossa skipper Francesco de Angelis, an America's Cup rookie from Naples.

An Italian victory "would bring a lot of different countries that haven't participated for a long while, or never participated," said tactician Torben Grael, a Brazilian who lives in Italy. "I think it will start a lot of interest in the Cup."

It would also mean that Italians back home won't have to stay up until 4 a.m. to watch the races on TV, like they do now.

One reason the Italians reached the Cup finals is because, well, they didn't sail like Italians have in the past. There were some tactical mistakes and boat handling errors, and they blew a 3-1 lead in the challenger finals to trail 4-3.

But they also threw two in-your-face moves at AmericaOne skipper Paul Cayard in winning the eighth race, then sped off in Race 9 to win the series.

"I think the harder it was, the better," Grael said. "I think it can only make us stronger."

New Zealand's mainsail trimmer Warwick Fleury, who has sailed with de Angelis and several of Luna Rossa's crew before, doesn't share the general belief that the Italians would collapse under America's Cup pressure.

"I am not surprised they came through," Fleury said. "They are not the kind to buckle. They deserve to be there."

Team New Zealand is still expected to be formidable. Led by skipper Russell Coutts, most of the sailors return from the 5-0 walloping of Conner off San Diego in '95. They're deep enough to have one crew for light winds and one crew for heavy winds.

"The guys on the boat are looking forward to getting to grips with Prada," said Team New Zealand leader Sir Peter Blake, who was knighted after the 1995 Cup win.