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TOKUSHIMA—Gloom
wasn’t the only feeling surrounding the Harbor
Restaurant, site of the dinner held minutes after Jordan
vaporized the Philippine Olympic dream.
There
was hope, faint but in these times absolutely necessary.
Manny V.
Pangilinan, president of the Samahang Basketbol ng
Pilipinas (SBP) and essentially RP basketball’s alpha
and omega, epitomized the “look forward” mentality, even
though the events that preceded Monday’s dinner pulled
back the positive mindset ever so strongly.
“Let’s
learn from it,” Pangilinan said. “We should be able to
analyze what we need to do. Maybe this was a strategic
loss. There are just more lessons to be learned.”
Pangilinan spoke to the media with such a diplomatic
demeanor it was hard to figure how much he was
disappointed. When one of the senior journalists finally
asked Pangilinan how depressed he was, Pangilinan found
it difficult to end sentences.
The hard
shell surrounding the most revered Filipino businessman
was transparent after all.
“Honestly? Very depressed,” Pangilinan admitted. “Sabi
nga ni Chot [Reyes], we’re bleeding kasi para sa
bansa ’yun.”
“It’s
not the end of the world for Philippine basketball but …
Sometimes lang minsan talagang nakakawalang ….
Sometimes you think, ‘Ganito na lang ba?’
Nawawalan ka ng pag-asa, ’di ba? Parang, ‘O my God,
will we ever make it?’ You find yourself asking that
question. Tao ka lang. But there’s still
tomorrow. We just have to do better.”
Off the
bat, Pangilinan, who assumed the post of the SBP
leadership when the new basketball federation was
created last February, said his group is eyeing to bid
for the FIBA-Asia championships in 2009, the zone
qualifiers for the World Championships in 2010 in
Turkey.
He also
raised the possibility of naturalizing a foreign player,
which is allowed by FIBA and has been a norm in the FIBA
Asia championships. Altering the professional rules to
suit FIBA standards has been broached as well, although
the jurisdiction belongs to the Philippine Basketball
Association.
“Getting
naturalized players is an option,” Pangilinan said.
“Honestly 2012 is five years away, and some of our
players will be too old to play there. So kailangang
mag-isip tayo,”
“You’ve
seen a number of those [naturalized players],” he added.
“Nakita mo si [Jordan starting guard Rashim]
Wright, s’ya ang pumatay sa’tin pero Amerikano naman
’yun.”
All the
players were red-eyed during dinner Monday. Apparently,
the team broke down in tears inside the locker room
after losing to Jordan, 84-76. After dinner, SBP vice
president Ricky Vargas engaged the group in a pep talk,
praising the team’s efforts despite the loss. When it
was Chot Reyes’s turn to speak, it was obvious the RP
coach took the failure gravely.
“I’m
sorry we failed to meet the expectations,” said Reyes,
who broke down at one point. “We tried everything we
could but we still fell short. I take full
responsibility for the loss. My players, I’m proud of
them and the effort they’ve put into this. If I had a
chance to go to battle again, I’d do it with this same
group of players.”
Consolation
Meanwhile, the last thing the heavy-hearted Philippine
team needed was to play less than 24 hours after their
crushing defeat Monday.
Worse,
the game had to go to overtime. Good thing, they came
out with a win.
Danny
Seigle scored seven of his 15 points in overtime and
Dondon Hontiveros chipped in six of his 11 in the
extension to lift the downtrodden Filipinos to a 107-100
victory over
Syria
yesterday at the ASTY Gym.
“I don’t
think we were emotionally ready to play this game after
the loss,” RP coach Chot Reyes said after the game. “I
doubt if any of our players had much sleep last night. I
told the players that when we signed up and committed to
play for the national team, we signed up to take in the
whole experience both pleasant and unpleasant. Obviously
this is the unpleasant part but part of the
representation of our national team is to go through it
all the way.”
And they
have to go through the classification stages which
determine the ninth to 16th places with wounded pride
and battered bodies.
Asi [Taulava]
and Kerby [Raymundo] are playing on sprained ankles.
Kelly Williams pulled his hamstring, while Mark Caguioa
hyperextended his shoulder, an old injury.
“Hopefully we can find the effort and the energy to
continue to play this through the end,” said Reyes.
“We’re
just getting beat up but we’ll find a way to get there.
Like I said, this team will never be short on fight. We
didn’t underestimate Syria. We respect them a lot. We
know they’re a very good team.
“We were
just fortunate enough to find that energy to finish the
game today.”
The
Philippines next play lowly India 9 a.m. at the
Tokushima Municipal Gym. |
