Gilas routs Thailand

Getting a wake-up call in the first quarter on Tuesday night, Gilas Pilipinas responded and continued blasting enemies off the floor in the Southeast Asian Basketball Association championship.

The Filipinos were dragged into their lowest scoring opening frame—and smallest first quarter lead—by Thailand before getting it all together in the second and blasting their foes to smithereens, 108-53, to move within two more wins of booking a slot in the Fiba Asia World Cup Qualifiers.

Japeth Aguilar came off the bench to shoot 23 points—the most by any Filipino here thus far—and led Gilas in scooting away from the game Thais for its fourth straight victory before a good-sized Smart Araneta Coliseum crowd that felt the jitters early.

“I wanted us to play our best game, but in the first quarter, we were far from that,” said Gilas coach Chot Reyes, after getting a total of four players in twin digits and all 12 men scoring. “But we made our adjustments and buckled down to work after that.”

Gilas also trained its defensive sights on Chitchai Ananti, whom Reyes described as someone “who can flat out play.” And the result was impressive as the Filipinos held the 6-foot-3 forward scoreless while allowing him just three field goal tries.

“We challenged our defenders to knock him down. We just wore him down with multiple defenders,” Reyes said after putting RR Pogoy and Calvin Abueva on Ananti.

Reyes said they would now focus on Vietnam, which they play on Wednesday.

“Vietnam on our minds; we’re not thinking of Indonesia yet,” Reyes said of the match against the Indonesians on Thursday, which would be for the championship.

The clash has become interesting after Indonesia’s naturalized player Jamarr Johnson finally got clearance to play.

Tournament commissioner Wong Chung Min of Malaysia finally got the go-ahead from Fiba and informed the Indonesian side, which has won its first four games even with Johnson sitting it out.

The Indonesians are actually set to welcome two players in their roster for their 3 p.m. clash with lowly Myanmar on Wednesday with Arki Wisnu, an Indonesian-American, also cleared by the Fiba.

“Indonesia already received the proper documents that will let these two players play,” said an official tournament statement prior to Tuesday’s heavy three-game schedule.