Chot: We’re very sorry
Gilas Pilipinas remains defiant despite bombing out in the FIBA Asia Cup in Jakarta.
Gilas head coach Chot Reyes cannot help but apologize after suffering an embarrassing playoff exit following a blowout 81-102 loss to Japan at the Istora Senayan late Tuesday.
It was a stinging loss to the much-improved Japanese, who finally got their first win over the Philippines in 12 years and sent Gilas to its worst Asia Cup output since their ninth place-finish in the 2007 edition in Tokushima.
“Obviously, the result is not what we wanted and again we’re very sorry that we’ve disappointed a lot of our countrymen,” Reyes said.
“But like I said, we brought a very young team here and the experience is just going to make them better.”
After sweeping all of their games in the preliminaries last year, including a back-to-back win over Korea in the qualifiers, expectations are high on Gilas in this 16-nation tournament.
Obviously, the result is not what we wanted and again we’re very sorry that we’ve disappointed a lot of our countrymen.
But things turned sour.
Injuries hit Gilas even before their campaign started with main gunner Dwight Ramos suffering shin splints, joining naturalized big man Ange Kouame in the sickbay.
Although Gilas got reinforcements in Japanese B.League standouts Kiefer and Thirdy Ravena, Ray Parks and TNT Tropang Giga veteran Poy Erram, they still had lackluster performance in their 80-95 opening loss to Lebanon. They bounced back with a 101-59 win over listless India, but they failed to ride on their momentum as they suffered a 75-95 loss to New Zealand to close their campaign in the preliminaries with a 1-2 win-loss card.
Gilas never recovered from there as they bowed to the hot-shooting Japanese bannered by National Basketball Association cager Yuta Watanabe, who had a sizzling all-around performance of 15 points, nine rebound and three assists.
Parks, on the other hand, fired 16 points and three assists while Ravena had 15 points and Carl Tamayo added 10 points for Gilas who trailed by as many as 16 points twice in the first half. Turn to page D22