Top basketball stakeholders rallied behind the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas (SBP) in its bid to form a solid team that will represent the country in the 2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup.

Gilas Pilipinas coach Chot Reyes said they have formally clinched the support of the stakeholders, who vowed to help them form the strongest, most competitive team that will campaign in the prestigious event that the country will host next year.

The Philippine Basketball Association (PBA), for one, had already made all of its players available and will hold only two conferences in Season 48 to give way for the World Cup — the world's biggest basketball event outside the Olympics.

It will also lend the players of teams who were eliminated from the Philippine Cup to Gilas Pilipinas for the fourth window of the FIBA World Cup Asian Qualifiers.

"We will have two conferences next season. That's what we can do to help Gilas," said PBA commissioner Willie Marcial, reiterating the statement he made shortly after the PBA board meeting last week.
"Our goal is to help them prepare for 2023."

The country's top collegiate leagues — the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) — also agree, saying that they don't see any problem lending their players since their schedules will not be in conflict with the World Cup.

"Technically, the schedules of both the NCAA and the UAAP won't get hit by the schedules of the qualifiers and the World Cup itself," NCAA management committee member Dax Castellano said.
"We will be ready to adjust for the Gilas team."

Assembling the country's best talents has been a problem for Gilas Pilipinas.

Actually, there was already a program in place with Kiwi-American tactician Tab Baldwin serving as head coach and program director.

But when the Covid pandemic struck the country, marquee players opted to pack their bags and play overseas, leaving the Gilas program in chaos.

Baldwin eventually resigned and the federation tapped Reyes, who is also the TNT Tropang Giga mentor in the PBA, to run the program.