Published November 11, 2019, 10:59 PM San Miguel Alab Pilipinas downs Gilas Pilipinas 93-89 in a tuneup game Monday at the Meralco gym in Pasig City. (Waylon Galvez)
By WAYLON GALVEZ
Gilas Pilipinas coach Tim Cone isn’t one who makes excuses. But after a 93-89 setback to San Migual Alab Pilipinas, the veteran mentor thinks his players didn’t have the same energy in the first tuneup game Monday night at the Meralco gym.
“I hate losing. As a national team, I really hate losing,” said Cone. “I don’t want to make excuses, but I thought we played a little tired. We didn’t have the energy we had the last game.”
“And they did some things to us that we weren’t prepared like a lot of switching, which we haven’t worked on with three, four practices. They did a good job against our pick and roll.”
Cone didn’t say it out loud but the reality of having players who are battling for survival in the ongoing PBA Governors’ Cup must be agonizing for him.
It was the second game of two friendly matches against the Alab squad which played with three imports in Adrian Forbes, Khalif Wyatt and Nick King.
The national team won last week 98-95.
Gilas will next play a pro team from Taiwan on Monday.
Despite the setback, Cone sees some positive takeaways.
“The good news is we battled, guys are pulling for each other all the time,” said Cone. “We were unselfish. We tried hard on defense although we were disorganized. Those are all the positives that we want to move forward on.”
“It’s a step back, but I think it’s a good step back that we have. So we understand how hard this is going to be, this is not going to come easy. This is a good message for everybody.”
“I hope it’s a step back for a two step forward,” said Cone, who got 14 points from Roger Pogoy, and 12 points apiece from Japeth Aguilar and PBA MVP June Mar Fajardo.
The tuneup games are a part of preparation for the national team, which will be aiming for the gold medal in the 30th Southeast Asian Games the country is hosting on Nov. 30 to Dec. 11.
Gilas played minus injured players Greg Slaughter (thumb) and Troy Rosario (Achilles), but finally had Kiefer Ravena in action – a late addition in lieu of guard Jayson Castro.
The veteran mentor expressed confidence that Slaughter and Rosario will be able to come back as he looks forward to a one-week window where they can have practice sessions for consecutive days.
“It’s very hard to have one practice and come back a week later and try to build on what you did a week ago because they forget it already, because they’re back to their mother teams,” he said.
“But we still have that one week prior to the SEA Games.”
Tags: 30th Southeast Asian Games , Basketball , Gilas Pilipinas , Greg Slaughter , Kiefer Ravena , PBA , Philippines , San Miguel Alab Pilipinas , Tim Cone
