At this point, it is futile to belabor on why there should not have been a coaching change in the Gilas program. Fans and netizens have already expressed their message loud and clear — we vehemently disagree with the decision.
The decision though has already been made. We can continue to curse and scream and post our opposition on social media, but the reality is that the die has been cast and the direction of the national team will now be crafted by the new people at the helm of the program.
It is safe to assume that the iteration of the Gilas Pilipinas squad that will be formed for the February window of the FIBA World Cup Asian Qualifiers is but a mere stop-gap measure.
The original Gilas pool is no more, so we will just improvise and put together the remnants of the previous pool and whoever is deemed fit for national duty from the core of the only PBA squad that can be compelled to contribute players to the national squad, the TNT Tropang Giga. Fortunately for the Philippines, the FIBA games in this window will have no bearing on our participation in next year’s World Cup since we have an automatic slot as a host country.
Moving forward, however, this practice of just putting together at the last minute a collection of players like a chop suey of ingredients to field in for a major event will not cut it. The fans know this. The basketball stakeholders know this. The empirical evidence substantiates this. In the 2019 FIBA World Cup, we fielded a Gilas team that had 10 full days of practices. We lost all five games by an average of 29.4 points. During last year’s FIBA 3×3 Olympic Qualifying Tournament, the four-man squad that was given roughly two weeks to prepare dropped all four games by an average of 7.75 points. In 3×3 parlance, these constitute blowout losses.
Photo from FIBA.basketball
There have always been talks going around that the PBA would eventually get involved in the country’s hosting of next year’s World Cup even when Tab Baldwin and the young Gilas pool were defying expectations by winning games and staying competitive against top-notch squads. Now that it has become a reality, it begs a number of questions.
First, what type of involvement will the PBA have in the composition of the national squad?
Second, how committed is the PBA to the national team’s cause and how much is it willing to sacrifice?
It does not take a genius to realize the previous practice of forming haphazardly a national team and giving it a short amount of time to train together simply does not work, except in the Southeast Asian Games where the competition is not on the level of our pro players.
Signs point out that this early in the Gilas program reboot, we are once again trekking down a familiar path that has led us to disastrous results in the past.
Photo by PBA Images
Despite having its core as part of the Gilas roster, TNT will still be playing four games in the first eight days of the restart of the PBA Governors’ Cup this February.
(C) San-En NeoPhoenix
The B. League had its last playdate last Sunday, February 6, and will resume its schedule on March 5. This is to allow its players to focus on national team duties.
Some would say that the league lent players to the Gilas program in the past shows how much the PBA bends over backward for the national team. We all know by now this contention is clutching at straws and is a desperate attempt to sanitize the league’s shortcomings.
While we are not asking for the league to stop its schedule given that it is already coming off a long, pandemic-induced delay, the PBA could have adjusted the TNT playdates in such a way that its players can be allowed to devote their attention at least for this month to the national team. That is a real commitment.
Real commitment also should mean allowing Coach Chot Reyes access to any player in the league whom he believes will be able to add value to the national pool. The PBA has always taken pride in its declaration that it still has the best players in the country. No one is disputing that. The next step then until the 2023 FIBA World Cup is to make everyone available for national team duty.
The eyes of the entire basketball world will be on the Philippines when we host the 2023 FIBA World Cup. The objective of the Gilas program should not be just to avoid embarrassing results but to become good enough to win games and advance deep in the tournament. Since the PBA is already involved, the only way for the Gilas team to achieve its goal is if the PBA extends its full cooperation. This will entail having all stakeholders commit to a common goal and getting everyone to set aside personal and club interests.
