PH cruises to 2nd straight victory

With the results of Gilas Pilipinas’ games in the Southeast Asian Basketball Association championship more or less a foregone conclusion, coach Chot Reyes is keeping a different kind of score.

And he was kind enough to explain.

“We wanted to beat our hustle numbers from the last game,” Reyes said after the Filipinos steamrolled their way past Singapore, 113-66, for the second of six wins they need to progress to the Fiba Asia World Cup Qualifying. “We did that in the first half, but we had a very poor second half.”

There’s no doubt that no team in this tournament would be able to even threaten the Filipinos, and Reyes is using this to find out if his players would be working harder than what is necessary to win these one-sided games.

“I understand the point of view of the players that it’s hard to play with sustained effort in games like this,” Reyes said. “That’s why I want to see them come up with the hustle points, points that don’t reflect in the stats sheets but points that will make us win tougher matches.”

Reyes was referring to effort—the one that gives Gilas extra possessions when they dive for loose balls, deflect passes or tap at rebounds they cannot pluck down, etc.

“That’s an important aspect of the game as far as we are concerned,” he went on before heading to the parking lot while allowing fans to take selfies with him. “Tonight I think we did pretty well in that department. Yes, I’m satisfied.”

The Filipinos gave up just 40 points in blowing Burma (Myanmar) off the Big Dome floor by 107 points on Friday night. The Singaporeans, though, reached that mark with still 6:21 left in the third period when Leon Kwek Wei Ming split his charities off June Mar Fajardo for 73-40.

Next up for the Filipinos is Malaysia, a side that Reyes admires because of the way it plays defense, which he describes as “spunky and tough.”

“We have to be prepared for their style of defending,” Reyes said of their 7 p.m. match Sunday also at Smart Araneta Coliseum.

Calvin Abueva scored 16 points, with Andray Blatche and Allein Maliksi adding 14 each.

Reyes’ only frustration was that the Filipinos allowed the Singaporeans to hit three-point conversions.

“That’s a no-no,” he said. “Imagine if we were playing Japan or South Korea. We need to address that.”