FOLLOWING a disappointing performance at the Doha International Cup, the Gilas Pilipinas are looking to improve their game in the final qualifying window of the 2025 FIBA Asia Cup Qualifiers, with their Final 12 roster announced.
After one of the longest, if not the longest, preparation periods in this year’s qualifiers, Gilas Pilipinas will go on to their final two games starting today, February 20.
On Wednesday, Feb. 19, Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas (SBP) announced the national team’s final lineup for the upcoming window, which includes familiar players as well as a few returnees.
Despite having plenty of reasons to be disappointed with their performance in the Doha friendlies, the men’s basketball’s primary goal is to finish the season on a good note and maintain their immaculate 4-0 win-loss record.
Final-for-Final
Moving on from all of the heartbreaks that occurred between their previous window and now, Gilas Pilipinas has adjusted their lineup after losing Kai Sotto, who sustained an anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injury.
The “Final-for-Final” 12 of Gilas will be led by naturalized player Justin Brownlee, as well as local players Scottie Thompson, Japeth Aguilar, June Mar Fajardo, CJ Perez, Chris Newsome, and Calvin Oftana.
They will be accompanied by the country’s most promising young players, Dwight Ramos, Kevin Quiambao, and Carl Tamayo. Returnees AJ Edu and Jamie Malonzo, who are fully healthy, will help boost the lineup.
Edu, a 6-foot-10 big man, is determined to fill Sotto’s void. This would be the 25-year-old’s first appearance since the FIBA World Cup, as he missed most of the Asia Cup qualifying games due to a chronic knee injury.
Meanwhile, Troy Rosario and Mason Amos did not make the final roster. They will sit out the first game and serve as backups for the February window if any problems arise along the way.
Are They Ready?
Gilas finished their Doha trip with a 1-2 record, having won just their first game in the entire event. The only team they defeated was Qatar on the first night, a close 74-71 win.
The Philippines’ next two nights after victory were dismal, as they were blown out by Lebanon 54-75 and Egypt 55-86. The greater question that fans are asking is whether this group is ready.
For Gilas head coach Tim Cone, the goal of the Doha trip is to prepare and allow them to identify the flaws that the current lineup has, which he discovered throughout the three-game span.
“We didn’t perform as well as we wanted to in Doha. Anytime we’re playing on the world stage against other national teams, it’s very important that we win,” Cone said in an interview in their final practice in Taiwan.
“But as we said from the very beginning, we wanted it to be tough. I think that teams learn from adversity, teams learn when it’s really hard. That’s why you have hard practices, why you play tough opponents because that makes you better,” he added.
The Real Deal
Although it was terrible for Cone to witness Gilas’ demise in the final two games of their friendlies, he is eager to move on and focus on the real deal: the two remaining qualifying games.
“It was not a lot of fun watching teams beat us up and we knew we should have played better. But again, that is then and that’s the past and they had nothing to do with the Qualifiers or our world ranking or anything,” Cone said.
“They were truly practice games so again this is where we need to be locked in and we’ll find out was that too hard for us, did it exhaust us too much for this or did it prime us for this? We’re hoping it will prime us for the Taiwan game,” he went on.
Gilas Pilipinas will attempt to repeat their overwhelming performance against the rebuilt Chinese Taipei at 7:00 p.m. today. Following that, the national team will meet its new-age archrival New Zealand on February 23 at 10:00 a.m.
