WITH the arrival of Dwight Ramos and three other players from the Japan B. League and Korean Basketball League, Gilas Pilipinas is finally now in full force.
And Gilas Pilipinas coach Tim Cone couldn’t be happier.
“It was the first time in practice that we had a complete pool,” said Cone, referring to the arrival of Ramos, AJ Edu, Carl Tamayo and Kevin Quiambao in time for the second window of the FIBA World Cup Asian qualifiers.
The four players finally joined practice of the national team, which will also shift its training camp from the Inspire Sports Academy in Laguna to the Mall of Asia Arena in Pasay City.
“Outside of Kai Sotto. QMB came in, KQ came in, Carl came, all came in and joined our first practice at Mall fo Asia,” said Cone.
Gilas Pilipinas is in the midst of its preparation for next week’s back-to-back games against world powers New Zealand and Australia .
Sotto, the 7-foot-3 Gilas Pilipinas center, will skip the FIBA window as he continues to rehabilitate and strengthen his condition after recovering from an ACL injury.
. But Cone said Gilas gets a big bonus with the entry of 6-foot-10 Quentin Millora-Brown, who initially begged off from joining the national team, but a last-minute talk between his camp and the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas ironed everything out.
The other pool members who attended practice are Scottie Thompson, RJ Abarrientos, Troy Rosario, Chris Newsome, June Mar Fajardo, CJ Perez, Calvin Oftana, Juan Gomez De Liano, and new addition Justine Baltazar.
Cone said the team has gone from being terrible right in its first training together last Monday to getting better, and finally everything clicking by the time the team practiced for the fifth day.
“That was the whole point when I was talking to the team about this program where you try to keep the team intact. So when they come back, you only have a minimum time, but it takes just a minimal amount of time to get back into the rhythm because you know each other, you know the system. It’s just more of a refresh,” said Gilas coach when he appeared in the weekly Power & Play program of former PBA commissioner Noli Eala.
The national team still has five days of training left before kicking off its second window campaign against New Zealand on Thursday at MOA.
By Sunday, Gilas takes on Australia also at the same arena in the battle between Group B leaders of the Asian qualifiers.
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