Jong Uichico joins national team

Coach Jong Uichico won’t be hollering instructions from the Barangay Ginebra sidelines anymore.
An eight-time PBA champion mentor, Uichico has asked for his release papers and decided to bring his top-level coaching expertise to the Philippine men’s basketball team.

The former La Salle and national team standout had taken San Miguel Beer to glorious heights with six championship crowns and added a couple of conference trophies more for Barangay Ginebra in a professional coaching stint that spanned over a decade.

It will be a homecoming of sorts for Uichico, whose star-studded, PBA-backed squad represented the national team and nearly reached the medal podium in the 2002 Asian Games in Busan, South Korea.

Uichico’s move, however, didn’t come as a surprise since the offer to join the Smart Gilas Pilipinas coaching staff has been on the table all along.

“We’ve been talking about the contributions that coach Jong could bring even before the Fiba Asia championship,” said Smart Gilas operations manager Butch Antonio.

Uichico, who shared the coaching chores with Siot Tanquingcen at Ginebra, is joining Chot Reyes, Ryan Gregorio and Norman Black in the Smart Gilas pool of coaches, which will pick the players of Smart Gilas II.
“The nice thing about coach Jong is that he’ll be focused on the team,” said Antonio.

Reyes is the head coach of Talk ‘N Text, Gregorio calls the shots for Meralco while Black, a TNT assistant, steered the Ateneo Blue Eagles to four straight championships in the UAAP and mentored the national five to victory in the last Southeast Asian Games in Indonesia last November.

The Smart Gilas five, a mix of former collegiate standouts, PBA stars and a naturalized player, finished fourth in the Fiba Asia Championship last year in Wuhan, China. The continental meet offered a lone automatic slot to this year’s London Olympics.

The Barangay Ginebra management thanked Uichico for his invaluable contributions to the most popular franchise in the pro league.

“With a heavy heart, we are sending coach Jong Uichico to the Philippine men’s basketball team because we feel that the national team is in need of someone like him to improve its performance in international tournaments,” said Ginebra San Miguel, Inc. president Bernie Marquez.

“It is the national interest at stake here and we believe that the Philippines will be very fortunate to get the services of a coach with the intelligence and experience of Jong,” added Marquez.

Uichico was part of the Northern Consolidated-sponsored national men’s team under coach Ron Jacobs and later moved up to head coach for the San Miguel Beermen in 1999, ending San Miguel’s five-year title drought with the Commissioner and Governor Cup titles.