Out of the 12 players that formed the core of the 2017 SEABA Championship team, two players were not fielded for either the upcoming FIBA Asia Cup in Lebanon or the Southeast Asian Games in Malaysia: Andray Blatche and Allein Maliksi.
Though Blatche has his own personal reasons for not participating in either tournament, Maliksi’s non-inclusion drew a lot of questions, especially after he’d averaged 10.0 points and 3.0 rebounds in the SEABA Championship.
Gilas Pilipinas head coach Chot Reyes offered an explanation, saying that the National Team was put into a position to pick just one player from the Star Hotshots to play for either the Asia Cup or SEA Games.
“We had to make a decision. We wanted to put him in the SEA Games lineup but we were asked not to put him in there first,” said Reyes.
Star will play two games during the stretch of the SEA Games, against Phoenix on July 23 and versus Rain or Shine on July 27.
“And then in the FIBA Asia, we had to make a decision between him and Jio (Jalalon),” Reyes furt thered.
“We felt we needed Jio more especially since we’re getting Gabe Norwood in anyway.”
Star do not have any games from August 8 to 20.
