Gilas primes up vs Korea, routs Japan
TAIPEI – Gilas Pilipinas warmed up for a key duel with South Korea today, pacing its key players before going all-out at the finish to breeze past the Japan U24 side, 100-85, for a third straight win after an opening game setback in the Jones Cup at the Taipei Peace Basketball Gymnasium here yesterday.
The Nationals closed out with a decisive 28-12 flurry to pull away from a 72-73 count in the last seven minutes of the game on their way to posting a follow-up to their back-toback wins over the hosts’ Team A and Team B.
But Gilas expects a tough outing against the South Korea team that has been unbeaten going to their matchup with Lithuania last night.
Gilas coach Chot Reyes said they played the young Japanese team with the Koreans in mind, thus, making a conscious effort to cut down the minutes of his core players to keep them fresh for the next game.
“We’re approaching the meat of our schedule, playing Korea and Lithuania backto-back. But we’re focused on Korea. It’s going to be a huge mountain for us,” said Reyes of their faceoff with their longtime regional archrival.
“Von Pessumal, (Alfonso) Gotladera and (Chris) Tolomia coming in to play some minutes allow us to play Mike (Myers), (Kiefer) Ravena and even (RR) Pogoy less minutes,” Reyes added.
Dragged into a tight duel through the first 33 minutes, Gilas went in full force in the crunch, unleashing a 12-to-nothing run to start a vicious windup that anchored their 15-point triumph.
After slowing down a bit against Taipei B, Christian Standhardinger was back in fierce form, firing 22 points and hauling down 15 rebounds.
Myers also provided Gilas tremendous lift in piling up 17 points and the same number of rebounds in a personal tournament-best showing.
Matthew Wright also sustained his hot-shooting ways, knocking in 15 points, including two treys, while Ravena and Jio Jalalon put in 11 markers each while alternately directing the Gilas play-patterns.
Wright, Ravena, Jalalon, Myers and Standhardinger carried Gilas through in the tough game.
“Like in any other elite tournament, there’s no such thing as an easy game. We knew we would be in for a tough match against Japan, and obviously they gave us everything we could handle,” said Reyes,
“We’re fortunate to pull it out in the end,” Reyes added.