CJ Perez shines in another game for Gilas Pilipinas. FIBA PHOTO
The Gilas Pilipinas basketball team waited for the final seconds of its last game before finally giving up.
National coach Yeng Guiao, who felt insulted after the Serbian national coach said the Philippines didn’t have quality to play on the world basketball stage, meekly admitted defeat following the national team’s last-gasp humiliation against Iran. Gilas Pilipinas exited with a horrid 0-5 win-loss record.
The small, poorly formed national team had never stood a chance. It didn’t have what it takes to be competitive on the global stage.
Coach Guiao promptly pointed to short, inadequate preparations as the main culprit.
He’s partly right. But what stood out was a crying need to revise and rebuild, introduce revolutionary changes.
They could go again and prepare for the longest period they wished. But they will predictably end up shamed and devastated in the end.
So what to do now after being left out in the cold?
Solutions must be studied intricately. There were ready calls to bring in a new coach, and Guiao said he would be more than willing to step out.
He did apologize and owned up to the World Cup debacle.
But, at the same time, the numerous young basketball diehards in our school leagues and in the countless sandlots all over the country must be invited to watch and observe the new-age proceedings in the China World Cup.
There must be an end to the wasteful sickening hype for fallen Gilas on national television.
There’s great, very relevant basketball theater available out there.
Sit back and relax, but watch very closely. This is the chance to savor great action and learn, be motivated and inspired by the super basketball powers in what promises to be a spectacular World Cup windup.
We are in what could go down as the most significant Fiba championship.
Of course, that won’t help if our basketball leaders would just sit down and stare.
There’s the urgent need to introduce fresh development structures in the fertile Philippine basketball landscape.
It goes without saying that we owe these countless young aspirants the teaching of sharp scientific skills, the basics of great competitive character, which could be done by working for improvements all the way down to the grassroots.
That, needless to say, is easier said than done.
But there must be a total shift, a new platform in national basketball development.
It must be fully systematic, thoroughly studied and planned, and forget about this nonsense about our national players always working hardest and doing their best for challenges on the global stage.
Gilas Pilipinas, pardon this, did work itself silly in preparing for the World Cup. But working hard blind is totally different from preparing prudently.
It appeared Gilas Pilipinas did not know the exact quality of competition in this year’s World Cup. Doing things hardest but improperly is a time-tested formula for disaster.