Gilas counts on family, crowd support in World Cup

MANILA, Philippines – Gilas Pilipinas gets much needed boost as some of the players’ families arrived just in time to watch their opening game against Croatia 6pm Saturday night (Manila time) at the Palacio Municipal de Deportes in Seville, Spain.

Families of Gilas coach Chot Reyes, Marc Pingris, Gabe Norwood, Jimmy Alapag, LA Tenorio and Japeth Aguilar’s girlfriend will join a huge Filipino crowd that is expected to fill up most of the 10,200-seater arena when they start the preliminaries against the world’s 16^th ranked team.  

“Mataas [ang morale ng team].  [Ang] dami na pamilya dito,” Gilas team manager Aboy Castro told Philstar.com on the eve of Gilas’ historic return to the world basketball championship after 36 years or since Manila hosted the tournament in 1978.

The whole team along with their families had a dinner on the eve of the opening of the 2014 FIBA World Cup capping off a six-week preparation that included the sacrifice to be away from their loved ones.

As evident in their silver medal run back home in the FIBA Asia Men’s Championship last year, Gilas can feed off the energy from the crowd.

Judging by the way Filipinos all over Spain showed up and cheered for Gilas during their tuneup games, the crowd support is expected to double and even triple as the Philippine contingent has already arrived in Seville led by Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas president Manny V. Pangilinan, PBA Commissioner Chito Salud and other federation and league officials and not to mention the avid Gilas fans, who shelled out huge money just to watch Gilas play against the world’s best teams in this momentous event for Philippine basketball.

Jeff Chan, who was energized by the big crowd delivering scintillating performances in their last three tuneup games, said the crowd really makes a huge impact on their game.

“Hopefully, magtuloy-tuloy. Alam mo, malaking tulong din yung mga fans na pumupunta sa venue para suportahan kami,” Chan told Philstar.com.

Chan was one of the bright spots during Gilas’ stretch run in their training camp after the Rain or shine gunner averaged 11.3 points in their last three games including a 20-point performance on 4-of-7 three-point clip in a big 74-65 win over FIBA Africa runner-up Egypt.

With the tall odds stacked against them, Gilas will need all the support from Filipinos in Spain and back home to have that fighting chance against the world’s best.