Golfballs, snowballs, basketballs … if it looks like a ball, Heidi wants it.

AUBURN – Heidi is hopping-barking-tail-wagging excited. The faded, portable basketball hoop has returned to the parking lot of T&M Mortgage Solutions, and Richard Huizar is holding a basketball.

In an instant, Huizar’s hoop shot is airborne and so is Heidi, front paws outstretched, jaws wide open, catching the ball between her paws and muzzle.

Back on the ground, she tries – in vain – to stuff the regulation-sized basketball into her lab-sized mouth.

“She’s always trying to get it and keep it for herself,” Huizar said.

Huizar adopted Heidi four years ago. She had been his roommate’s dog for years and, before that, his roommate’s daughter’s dog. He believes Heidi is 13 years old, maybe older.

But age doesn’t seem to matter when there’s a ball in sight. She chases golf balls, leaps after snowballs, hunts for round rocks that vaguely resemble balls. Some she likes to carry. Most others she likes to destroy. Heidi can reduce a stress relief ball to fine fluff in minutes.

Basketballs are her favorite. She’s popped a few of them, digging her teeth and claws into the rough hide in an attempt to grab hold, but it hasn’t phased Huizar.

A loan officer with T&M Mortgage Solutions, he brings Heidi to work with him once or twice a week. At home, she’s easy-going, the couch-potato type. At work, Huizar’s break-time free throws give them both some exercise.

For a couple of weeks the hoop was gone, taken to the business owner’s home for his daughter. On Monday it was back.

“C’mon Heidi girl! Come on!” Huizar called, dribbling during a break, the thwack-thwack-thwack drowned out by Heidi’s excited barks.

He tossed the ball through the hoop, and as it descended Heidi was there, a mid-air blur of yellow fur and wagging tail.

Over and over, she caught rebounds, wild throws, perfect nothing-but-net shots. Sometimes she trapped the ball as it bounced, dribbling the ball between chin and pavement before she could get it to stay still.

When the ball strayed under a parked car, Heidi scrambled on her belly and stretched a paw to fish it out. She ran after it as it rolled away.

After 20 minutes, the ball was slick with drool and both Huizar and Heidi were done. When the ball bounced on the grass, Heidi slowly trotted after it and collapsed next to it with a tongue-lolling grin.

“Good girl,” Huizar said.