Gilas facing short preparation

Gilas Pilipinas will have less than a week of preparation for must-win games against Syria and Iran in the fifth window of the 2027 FIBA World Cup Asian Qualifiers late this month.

Head coach Tim Cone won’t have a complete team until 21 November, when the Philippine-based and overseas Gilas members rendezvous in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, for a short training camp.

“We won’t have a full team until we get down to Kuala Lumpur,” Cone said.

“We got a couple of guys, I think, leaving on the 20th and the bulk of the team will leave on the morning of the 21st. And then we practice in the evening.”

Cone and Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) players Scottie Thompson, Juan Gomez de Liaño, CJ Perez, Scottie Thompson and Chris Newsome are already free to train; however, those from abroad are yet to be released by their clubs.

“I mean, we could have a practice, but it would be with four players. It doesn’t make sense for us to have a practice with four players. Again, all these guys, I mean the PBA guys, we could have practices with them, but again, it’s only four players. Everybody else is from overseas,” the decorated mentor said.

Debuting naturalized player Bennie Boatwright, who obtained his Philippine passport last month, will come in just four days before Gilas takes on Syria on the 27th.

The Philippines will face Iran on the 29th.

The replacement for injured Justin Brownlee is still playing with the Fujian Sturgeons in the ongoing Chinese Basketball Association.

“We’re certainly going to miss Justin, however. Justin, he just knows what to do. And that’s going to be the difference. Benny is going to maybe struggle a little bit with what he’s supposed to do and how he’s supposed to do it. But we’re hoping his talent will win out on that,” Cone said of his new player that will have to learn his system quickly.

Rhenz Abando and Kevin Qiambao will be coming from Korea while flying directly to Malaysia from Japan are AJ Edu, Quentin Millora-Brown, Dwight Ramos and Mike Phillips.

Seven-foot-3 Kai Sotto is expected to make a stop in Manila before flying to Malaysia.

To make up for lost time, Gilas is scheduled to have two practice sessions a day.

“We’ll be doing some two-a-days down there to try to make up for it. But we want to be careful. We don’t want our guys to get too tired trying to do two-a-days. So, we have to be smart with it,” Cone said.

“We were going to have two-a-days on the 22nd and 23rd, but Bennie’s not going to be there. So, we moved those two-a-days to 24 and 25. So, we’ll have extra practices with Bennie.”