Officials: Overseas and injured players made bulk of 37-man Gilas list for Asiad
MANILA, Philippines – The 37-man list submitted by Philippine basketball officials to the Hangzhou Asian Games Organizing Committee was full of players campaigning outside the country as well as collegiate ones.
According to the list, as posted on X (formerly Twitter) by News5’s Martie Bautista on Tuesday afternoon, a bulk of the players listed are either playing in Korea and Japan or in collegiate leagues.
LOOK: Gilas Pilipinas released the 37 players left out of the 60 they initially submitted to the Hangzhou 2022 Asian Games Organizing Committee. | via Martie Bautista/News5#AsianGames #HangzhouAsianGames pic.twitter.com/n9yRIwKK8D
— One Sports (@OneSportsPHL) September 19, 2023
Some players, on the other hand, are injured.
Currently, there are eight players who are sure to be included in the Asiad-bound Gilas Pilipinas team — June Mar Fajardo, Chris Newsome, Calvin Oftana, Justin Brownlee, Japeth Aguilar, Scottie Tompson, Angelo Kouame and newly installed Marcio Lassiter.
Lassiter was inserted in the squad after RR Pogoy had to beg off due to an injury.
Meanwhile, in the 37-man list are overseas campaigners such as Rhenz Abando, Juan Gomez de Liano, Bobby Ray Parks, Carl Tamayo, RJ Abarrientos, SJ Belangel, Jordan Clarkson, AJ Edu, Kiefer Ravena, Thirdy Ravena, Dwight Ramos and Jordan Heading.
Collegiate stars Ben Phillips, Jerom Lastimosa, Deschon Winston, Mason Amos, Michael Phillips and Kevin Quiambao are also part of the list.
Injured players Jeremiah Gray, Brandon Ganuelas-Rosser, Jamie Malonzo and Pogoy were inserted as well.
This thus left Gilas to a pool of only a handful of players — Arvin Tolentino, Chris Ross, CJ Perez, Kevin Alas, Christian Standhardinger, Poy Erram, Aaron Black and Lassiter — available for the Asiad.
With Standhardinger and Erram retiring from national team duties, the team went for 6-foot-5 Tolentino, 6-foot-1 Ross, 6-foot-2 Perez, 6-feet-tall Alas and 6-foot-2 Lassiter as replacements for guard Terrence Romeo, and forwards Calvin Abueva, Jason Perkins and Mo Tautuaa.
The status of Romeo, Abueva, Perkins and Tautuaa are still unclear as they are not part of the 37-man list.
Also revealed Tuesday was a list of 60 players who might be tapped by Gilas for the Asiad . In the list, only Abueva and Perkins are not included, but with the injuries to both Malonzo and Ganuelas-Rosser, the Philippine team tried to petition for the inclusion of the two.
(Photos provided by STAR's Olmin Leyba)
Gilas head coach Tim Cone said that they only received word a few days ago that a second list of 37 was submitted. Romeo, Tautuaa, alternate player Stanley Pringle and both Abueva and Perkins were not included in that second list.
While they have the four new players on standby, there is still a small window open for Gilas to go with their original group to play in the Asiad.
According to Cone, this is because they still have not received a “final word” regarding the status of the four players originally planned to be included.
The team is expecting to hear back from the committee in one to two days.
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