Gilas Pilipinas set to fight the skyscrapers anew

Ignacio Dee

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Gilas Pilipinas set to fight the skyscrapers anew
As the Philippine men's national basketball team prepares to take on the world's best once again, the coaches of the last team to make it to the World Championship reflect on Gilas

It was a rainy week in late September 1978 when the best players of amateur basketball winged in to Manila for the World Basketball Championship in October. They were so tall, so efficient and so boring.

Can no one drive, dunk and float on air? Must they dribble quickly, make two or three passes and then pass to their gunner who shoots so well that he must have spent all his playing years at the Araneta Coliseum instead of a gym in Yugoslavia, the Soviet Union, Italy, Brazil, Czechoslovakia?

PBA fans thought: let us be rid of these stratospheric, mechanical players as soon as possible. But they realized they deserved their status. They braved the rain to watch them play at the Araneta or the Rizal Memorial Coliseum, the second venue.

Yugoslavia, the eventual champions, had the deadly Drazen Dalipagic and shooting guard Dragan Kicanovic. These two took a pass, seldom dribbled but when they fired, as they say here: ilista mo na. The Philippine team national coach, Nic Jorge Jr., smiled and shook his head as he recalled Dalipagic, the 6-foot-6 forward, then Europe’s best player, and MVP of the Manila event.   

“He just gets the ball and releases it this way,” Jorge told Rappler.com as he rose from his chair to show Dalipagic’s smooth release. “He doesn’t set himself so much and he shot from nearly every spot,” added Jorge, founder of the popular Milo BEST basketball clinics. 

Stanislav Eremin, the Soviet Union’s cool point guard, would pass to 7-foot-3 Vladislav Tkachenko, who moved to his right to uncork that killer hook shot or shoot off a smaller defender. Pierluigi Marzorati, the Italian spitfire who dribbled left but shot right, passed to their gunner, Renzo Bariviera, or fed the ball to their bruiser, veteran Dino Meneghin. 

Brazil was the crowd favorite. A year before, key members of the Brazilian national squad, joined a PBA event and finished second to Toyota, who used—like all pro teams– two imports at a time. Their star, 6-foot-8 Oscar Schmidt, and colorful Milton Setrini hypnotized cage fans with fancy dribbling and sharp passing which ended in an easy Schmidt jumper.

Nemie Villegas, Jorge’s assistant coach, recreated Schmidt’s steely gaze towards the basket and his picture-perfect release. “He makes it look so easy. Did you see how he made shot after shot in overtime?,” recalled Villegas as he referred to Brazil’s third place win against Italy in Manila. Schmidt, the all-time leading scorer in Olympic and world basketball championships, made the Naismith Hall of Fame in 2013.

These were the men our Philippine team faced. Weakened after some of the best young players were tapped to the national youth squad to defend the Asian Youth title held at the same time as the world championship, Jorge whipped the nationals into shape with a five-day, twice a day training, then considered revolutionary.

Jorge cracked the whip. “Virtual Martial Law,” recounted Villegas. Their road run, from Letran to Cultural Center of the Philippines, was done six times a week. Court practice reached three hours. Jorge made the team’s joker, Alex Clarino, the captain, “to give him responsibility.” Discipline, Jorge, former UP playing coach said, is the key to my basketball philosophy.

Being hosts, the Philippines were seeded to the quarterfinals. “I told them what to expect early on. I told the players to play their normal game. No pressure. But they must fight,” he said.

On October 6, the Philippines faced Yugoslavia. Big men Pol Herrera, Padim Israel and Joy Carpio held the Yugoslavs to a 45-54 halftime deficit but in the second half, Dalpagic cut loose with a team-high 31 points for a 117-101 victory. “We matched up with them in the first half but the boys got tired fighting them under the basket,” said Jorge.

The Soviet Union routed the Philippines, 110-63, as Ramon Cruz, the lanky off-guard who shot 31 points against Yugoslavia was held to two points. Tkachenko did not see much action but Alexander Belostennyi and Alzan Zharmukamedhov starred for their team. 

Brazil prevailed 119-72 behind Schmidt’s 27 and Setrini’s 22. A 112-75 rout by Italy, sparked by Bariveria’s 25 points and Meneghin’s dominance, matched the fury of a storm in Manila. Tired, the Filipinos limped to their lowest half time score of 21 against Australia’s 48 as the Aussies romped top a 97-52 victory.

Cruz’s 33 points and Carpio’s 18 were unable to lift their team out of a 99-80 loss against Canada as the Philippines lost its six quarterfinal matches.

The seeds of deeper Asian dominance were being sown as coaches and players of the Asian Youth squads watched the games at the Araneta for free. Lito Puyat, then head of the Basketball Association of the Philippines, made this decision that anyone who is properly accredited can watch, said Moying Martelino, his former secretary general.

The 1978 Asian Youth was the last the Philippines would win. It was dethroned in 1980, regained in 1982 and since then, the country had not recovered its dominance. The PBA was the scapegoat, but when FIBA allowed open basketball, the pro-led squad could only finish second to China in the 1990 Asian Games, sparking flagellation by cage fans. 

Science, technology has replaced intuition, diskarte, salaksak. For the FIBA World Championship, Jorge said the national team should “play their normal game.” Jorge’s team fed off the emotions of the home crowd but Chot Reyes’ men have been cheered by our Filipino workers in their tuneup series. The days when the Philippines used to be one of the top cage powers is over but not being crushed by skyscrapers who can move as well as our small men is no small consolation. – Rappler.com

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