Gilas back home

Gilas Pilipinas arrived home last night from a 17-day training trip in Estonia and Lithuania with a ton of lessons learned playing in six tune-ups. But the biggest lesson was making sure every player is ready to step in when a teammate goes down. That mentality comes from a spirit of togetherness, something that coach Chot Reyes has instilled since practice began at the Meralco Gym last June 7 and continued at the Inspire Sports Academy. What started as a 21-man pool was reduced to only 14 in the Europe camp, including Justin Brownlee who joined from Los Angeles and Ange Kouame who skipped the Estonia leg to attend his graduation. AJ Edu came along for the ride but never played a game to recover from a sprained ankle.

While in Europe, Gilas suffered casualties that further decimated the cast. Scottie Thompson sat out five of the six tune-ups, first due to back spasms and next, a fracture in his right hand. Dwight Ramos hurt his ankle after playing only three minutes in the fifth game then joined Poy Erram at the sidelines in the sixth. Chris Newsome soldiered on with a bruised knee. With Ramos gone, Jamie Malonzo picked up the slack to score 14 points against the Lithuanian Pro Select and 11 against the Lithuanian Universiade squad. Kiefer Ravena filled in for Thompson and averaged 14 points in the last two tune-ups.

When the FIBA World Cup gets underway, the 12-man lineup that is submitted the day before hostilities reel off won’t change until the end of the tournament. It’s unlike in the FIBA qualifying windows where rosters can change the day before each game for as long as players come from a previously approved pool. So if players are injured during the World Cup, they can’t be replaced. Note that in the 2019 FIBA World Cup, Jayson Tatum was hurt in the preliminary game against Turkey and was on the bench when the US lost to France, 89-79, in the knockout quarters. Tatum couldn’t be subbed in the lineup despite his injury.

Although the scores weren’t as important as the experience Gilas got from the tune-ups, it’s worth examining the numbers to show where to improve. Brownlee hadn’t played since the SEA Games and came off a one-week rest from a medical procedure so when he played against Estonia’s U21 team in the first tune-up, he wasn’t in game shape. He scored eight points then left the court for good with cramps in the third quarter. In the second tune-up, Brownlee continued to struggle with 11 points. But in his last three outings, Brownlee was back in the groove averaging 21.7 compared to 10.7 in his first three. June Mar Fajardo was a huge positive as he hadn’t seen action since suffering the partial tear in his MCL during the EASL Champions Week last March. Fajardo hit at a 7.3 clip in his first three games then raised it to 16.7 in his last three. In the final tune-up, the Kraken shot 28 points, including 14 of 15 free throws.

Reyes did some experimenting with combinations. Fajardo and Brownlee were fixtures in the starting cast but Ravena, Thompson, CJ Perez, Rhenz Abando, Newsome and Ramos also had turns in the first five. Japeth Aguilar moved from five to four and Brownlee from four to three as Reyes tested what could work with Fajardo and eventually, Kai Sotto at center. Three-point shooting went up several notches in the last game as Gilas hit 48 percent, way over its tournament average of 34.7 percent. Assist-to-turnover ratio was a high 21:9 in the fifth tune-up but a sub-par 15:17 in the fourth.

Gilas won three and lost three in the tune-ups. Reyes said team defense has to improve particularly in covering ballscreens, screen-rolls and pick-and-pops. In the 90-80 loss to Lithuania’s Pro Select, Gilas went up against 6-9 Tomas Zdanaviscus, 27 (veteran of the Macedonia, Estonia, Iceland, Slovakia and Lithuanian leagues), 6-7 Vytautas Sulskis, 34 (3x3 World Tour specialist from Youngstown State), 6-4 Justinas Ramanauskas, 22 (Lithuanian U16 and U19 player now with the Nuernberg Falcons of the German league) and 6-6 Rokas Pocius, 27 (import in Italy since 2018). So the opposition wasn’t light even if the Pro Select had only eight players. And the Universiade team was led by Lithuanian national player 6-5 Arnas Berucka, 26, who was previously with the U16, U18 and U20 teams.