Tim Cone knows how much talent there is out there in men’s basketball, but reiterated that expanding the Gilas pool isn’t at the top of their priorities for now.
The veteran internationalist is focusing on keeping his roster intact, even as fans and observers would want to bring in more faces, especially after a rag-tag team conquered the recent 33rd Southeast Asian Games in Thailand.
“There’s only 12 guys,” he told reporters Sunday night, moments after leading Barangay Ginebra to a 108-105 decision over Titan Ultra in the final game of the PBA Season 50 Philippine Cup eliminations at the SMART Araneta Coliseum.
A mix of PBA players, B.League imports, and collegiate standouts made up the squad of Coach Norman Black, which earned plaudits for overcoming the odds to help the Philippines secure its 20th men’s basketball gold in the biennial tilt.
Most of the figures that took part in that team were actually former Gilas Men members themselves, namely Jamie Malonzo, Ray Parks, Matthew Wright, Thirdy Ravena, Robert Bolick, Poy Erram, Abu Tratter, and Von Pessumal.
Of course, he couldn’t feel prouder to see them succeed, particularly Parks and Wright, both of whom he and his staff tried to call up for a tour of duty in the past but couldn’t due to scheduling conflicts.
“We’ve been looking at Ray-Ray for a long time, you know. We actually asked him to join us one time, but he couldn’t — I think it was the OQT — ’cause he was getting engaged. He had an engagement ceremony here,” he recalled.
“We asked Matthew Wright, but he was in Canada at that time and couldn’t get his passport. And then we asked [Jordan] Heading as well,” he added.
“We’ve had all those guys in our radar. And along with Jamie, the Ravena brothers have always been something we’ve talked about.”
(C) POC Pool
But after representing the country once more after some time, could that pave the way for a Gilas comeback? Many people have asked the same question after the players proved their worth once more in Bangkok.
Cone, however, stressed that the brain trust wants to focus on the kind of program they’ve been setting up based on their experiences in the past.
Given that this current Gilas iteration has been working within the PBA calendar, keeping a compact pool appears to be the most ideal, especially with the limited amount of practice time they get for tournaments.
“Again, we don’t want to increase it to a huge pool because that’s too unwieldy for the time of preparation that we have,” Cone said.
In fact, he even cited the previous Gilas of Chot Reyes as an example to prove that a big pool would work more effectively in certain situations, such as when the men’s team was gearing up for the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023.
“Like when Coach Chot prepared for the World Cup, we had like three months to prepare for that,” said Cone, who was part of Reyes’ staff. “And so we had a pool of 20, 25 people because we couldn’t get everybody there every day.
“Sometimes, we had a pool of 25, only eight guys showed up. So it was important to have a big pool there,” the 68-year-old tactician added.
However, for competitions such as the ongoing 2027 World Cup Asian Qualifiers, which takes place on a window basis, a small roster should be more manageable — especially from a coaching standpoint.
“When you’re talking about maybe five, six practices before you have to play, you can’t bring in 20 guys and get them ready,” said Cone, who officially took over Gilas Men back in February 2024.
“Like I said, there’s only 12 guys.”
