A winger in his mid-20s without any NRL experience and only in his second year of Queensland Cup, the pandemic hit after moving across from New Zealand.
He was among the players in danger of losing their livelihoods when the game shut down in early 2020 with no return in sight for semi-professional players.
"At that point, I thought the window was getting smaller for me to make NRL," the Sydney Roosters winger told AAP ahead of Friday's semi-final against Melbourne.
"I was only getting older.
"The only reason I moved to Australia was footy. So when it got cancelled, I wasn't sure what I was going to do.
"I didn't know whether to just give up or wait it out."
Pauga initially decided to return home.
Kiwi-born, the outside back spent 10 years of his life - from five to 15 - living in Samoa playing three-on-three backyard football with a water bottle filled with grass.
He earned a Warriors contract shortly after his move back to New Zealand, but his NRL dreams were slashed in 2018 when he tore his ACL and was let go by the club.
Picked up by Wynnum-Manly, Pauga returned for 13 Queensland Cup games in 2019 but wanted the comforts of home in New Zealand amid a life of lockdowns and no football.
But like so many others, those plans were scuppered when New Zealand's borders were slammed shut.
Pauga then returned to park-level football with several Kiwis in a similar predicament - and by chance his dream of playing in the NRL remained alive.
He scored a try as Wynnum Juniors won that year's A-Grade Brisbane Rugby League final and kept himself in Australia when Queensland Cup resumed the following year.
Within months he found himself at Wests Tigers and while he was released by the joint-venture last year and again left in limbo, an opportunity later arose at the Roosters' feeder-club North Sydney.
"I think it would have been different if the borders were open," Pauga said.Â
"Obviously I would have still played rugby league, but this opportunity wouldn't have come for me."
Pauga will play in the biggest game of his life on Friday night, as part of a severely undermanned Roosters backline with no first-choice wingers or centres.
But the Roosters are adamant it won't be their death knell this season.
The 27-year-old is proof inexperience is no issue, averaging 164 metres in each of his eight games after going on a try-scoring blitz for the Bears in NSW Cup.
"It hasn't been easy," Pauga said.
"But I think just having that belief and faith that everything happens for a reason, you just have to keep going and hopefully everything falls into place."
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