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Gilas holds 'encouraging' first practice

The Gilas players and SBP officials say a prayer before plunging into their first practice. (Photo by Jude Roque)

The Gilas Pilipinas National Men’s basketball team has formally started its preparations for the FIBA Asia Championship here on August this year as the 17-man pool held its first practice Monday night at the Philsports Arena in Pasig City.  In attendance were the 15 PBA players recently named by head coach Chot Reyes to the pool along with naturalized import Marcus Douthit and cadet pool member Greg Slaughter.

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Except for Rain Or Shine’s Jeff Chan, who has an injured left hand, all the PBA stand-outs – Ginebra’s LA Tenorio, Global Port’s Gary David and Japeth Aguilar, San Mig Coffee’s Marc Pingris, Petron’s June Mar Fajardo, Rain Or Shine’s Gabe Norwood, Alaska’s Sonny Thoss, and Talk ‘N Text’s Jimmy Alapag, Jason Castro, Jared Dillinger, Larry Fonacier, Kelly Williams, Ryan Reyes and Ranidel De Ocampo – participated in the two-hour work out, witnessed by no less than SBP President and top patron Manny V. Pangilinan, SBP Executive Director Sonny Barrios, and other officials of the MVP Group of Companies.

Reyes, along with assistants Joseph Uichico, Norman Black, Ryan Gregorio, Nash Racela and Josh Reyes, introduced the Dribble Drive Motion that has produced at least two PBA titles for Talk ‘N Text when he was at the helm of the Texters’ coaching chores.

While the current PBA conference is on going, Gilas will be having practices every Monday evenings at the Mall of Asia Arena, which will be the venue for the Asian Championship in August.  But right after the conference, Gilas will have a full two-month training schedule that includes a basketball camp in Lithuania and several tune-up games with foreign club and national teams.  Gilas will also defend its crown in the Jones Cup.

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The FIBA Asia Championship will serve as the qualifying tournament for the 2014 FIBA World Cup in Spain, where the top three Asian teams will lock horns against the best national teams around the globe. 

This Gilas pool is evidently the tallest national basketball team ever assembled in the country, with the 7’0” Slaughter, 6’11” Douthit, 6’10” Fajardo, 6’9” Aguilar and 6’7” Thoss.  It also includes a tall guard line-up in the 6’5” Norwood, 6’4” Dillinger and 6’3” Chan.  The pool will be cut down to the final 12-man line-up before the Asian Championship.

“Encouraging,” was how Reyes described the first day of training for this elite group tasked to bring back the country to the basketball world map.  “Very evident yung engagement ng players at yung kanilang excitement was very evident, in fact even MVP could feel it.  It showed that the guys genuinely wanted to be here.  That’s very, very important.  It’s a good start considering all the battles we went through to even get to this point.  I think finally getting it started is very important,” added Reyes.

THE 17-MAN GILAS POOL: