Gilas comes out ‘average’ against Iran in first tune up

Gilas Pilipinas warms up ahead of its tune up game against Iran. Photo by Mark Giongco

Gilas Pilipinas played with a lot of energy but had too many lapses against Asian power Iran in a scrimmage, the Filipinos’ first test since coming into camp seven months ago.

And less than a month before it takes on its real challenge in the Fiba Olympic qualifying tournament, head coach Tab Baldwin assessed his team’s performance against a physical Iran side, missing its best player ,as sub-par.

“We were average which is probably about what I expected. Defensively, Iran was a little bit too quick for us in the execution of their offense and that’s something that we would expect from a team that’s a little bit ahead of us,” Baldwin told reporters on Tuesday. “Their speed was impressive, our attention to detail defensively was it was lacking but that was the camp is for. We always knew the camp would be for that.”

Baldwin added he didn’t see anything from Gilas that jumped out, while saying the team could’ve had a better outing offensively.

“I think offensive execution, we could’ve been better than we were today. I think we were comfortable with the talent that we have out there on the court, we were a little bit too comfortable with that because that gap, if we had a gap today in talent, and an advantage of talent, that will disappear when we get to the OQT. So we’ll have to be able to exploit our talent but at the same time, we have to have every player ready to step up when asked.”

Andray Blatche, Japeth Aguilar, Calvin Abueva, Gabe Norwood and Jayson Castro were Baldwin’s starting five while fielding in an entirely different lineup in the second quarter with June Mar Fajardo, Marc Pingris, Ray Parks, LA Tenorio and Terrence Romeo.

The Iranians just competed in the West Asian Basketball Association (WABA) tournament in Jordan where they won the gold while Gilas hasn’t played against any other team but themselves until Tuesday’s tuneup against the Iranians.

Gilas had its moments but the team is still very much a work in progress as evidenced by the kind of mistakes it made. There were unnecessary fouls, unforced turnovers and miscommunication on the defensive end leading to uncontested baskets.

“I’m pleased that we’ve put that talent out on the court that we can put out there, but the cohesion and the chemistry we’re still short of that but that doesn’t surprise me,” Baldwin said.

The scrimmage wasn’t a typical basketball game as every after the 10-minute quarters, the score was reset to nil-nil. The tuneup was supposed to be closed-door but spectators and the media were allowed to watch.

“That was the agreement,” Baldwin said of the unusual setup. “We weren’t interested in making this into a game. This was always gonna be just a scrimmage, giving the coaches opportunities to work on situations unfortunately, coach Bauermann was ill right now, so he wasn’t able to come. We wish him well and we hope he’ll be able to come tomorrow so this can be as useful for Iran as it will be for us.”

“But there’s nothing strange about that. That’s why this was never designed to be for the public, for the media, this was for the coaches really.”

Gilas surprised Iran and won the first 10 minutes of the scrimmage, 21-13, with Blatche, the naturalized center, hitting from inside and out and kept the Iranians on their heels.

Iran, playing minus Hamed Haddadi, was able to settle down and make it interesting in the next quarter with its big men doing most of the damage, 16-15, and off another defensive blunder, the Iranians were able to take the last period as well as Blatche’s last-second 3-pointer misfired.

Gilas and Iran play again on Wednesday night at Araneta Coliseum, a game that Baldwin expects to be more competitive than the first.

“Another game tomorrow that would be competitive. It would be tough. This is a very big, rugged frontline that Iran has and it would be educational for us which is why we’re doing it,” Baldwin said.