Lesson learned for Pinoy cagers

Gilas Pilipinas heads to Poland with hopes of a better showing in the last of its two tune-up games leading up to the FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournament (OQT) in Latvia next month after getting a feel of the European style of basketball.

The Filipinos will face world No. 15 Poland on Sunday (Manila time) in the final stop of their buildup for the Riga OQT running from 2 to 7 July.

Gilas suffered an 84-73 loss to world No. 24 Turkey on Friday in Istanbul where the hosts torched the Tim Cone-mentored squad with 14 triples.

Although trailing for most of the game, Gilas showed they could match with higher-ranked teams.

A little more adjustments and polishing should do the trick.

“We move on to the next game with a firmer belief that we can hold our own against higher ranked teams with a real chance of reaching our mission of making it to Paris,” Gilas team manager Richard del Rosario said.

Just like Cone’s intention, playing Turkey and Poland will give him a chance to assess where Gilas’ level of competitiveness is at before they take on the daunting task of shooting for a spot for the Paris Olympics slated from 26 July to 11 August.

Bannering Poland are scorers Michal Michalak and Michal Sokolowski and 7-foot-2 center Alecsander Balcerowski.

The Polish team is also building up for a separate OQT leg in Valencia, Spain.

Only naturalized player Justin Brownlee and June Mar Fajardo scored in double figures for Gilas against the Turkish team preparing for the FIBA Eurobasket qualifier in November.

Cone hopes his other gunners in the lean 11-man roster will be able to shake the rust off in time for the OQT.

Gilas will face world No. 6 Latvia on 3 July before taking on world No. 23 Georgia the following day.

The Philippines has not returned to the Summer Games basketball competition since its last stint in the 1972 Munich Olympics.