Pinoys attempt to beat Guinness basketball marathon record for Yolanda victims

It was a little past four in the afternoon inside the Meralco Gym, the homecourt of the PBA’s Meralco Bolts. When the team practiced here, parking was always a tough chore. Players, coaches, and their crew took up most of the space. Fans who wanted to visit their favorite players took up the rest of the slots.

There was basketball being played inside the gym in the uncharacteristically gloomy March afternoon but parking was a breeze.

Instead of professional basketball players, there were amateurs on the floor. Instead of scrimmage, there was a real game going on.

The score was 819 to 783 (not a typo) with Team Bounce Back leading Team Walang Iwanan. The two teams are competing in the game but they are there for the same task. They want to set a new Guinness World Record for the longest basketball game ever player.

The clock read 6:57:23. I guess this could be considered very early in the first quarter of the game. The two teams aim to beat a record of 112 hours and 13 seconds set by the Missouri Athletic Club in St. Louis two years ago. The event is organized by Asian Cable Enterprises, Inc (ACCESS) in cooperation with Gawad Kalinga.

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I walked into the court not knowing what to expect. I’ve never seen a marathon basketball game before. What greeted me was something very familiar. It was basically a pick-up game in steroids, lots of steroids.

All of the normal features of the games that you and I play are there. Playing defense by shouting instead of actually defending, that one player who always leaks out for the fastbreak, that old guy who throws the perfect passes, the And-1 dribbler, the deadshot, and the energy guy who does not really know how to play basketball but is somehow good because he’s just too damn athletic.

Before I got there, I read that there will be foreigners in the squads. Chuck Williams, Jeffrey Moore and Tony Tatar, at least in my mind, sounded like names of athletic 6-foot-6 players who are borderline pros. I imagined them to be magnificent physical specimens who can play ball for hours and hours. They weren’t. The three imports were no taller that the rest of the players there. I don’t think their basketball careers went further than Sunday ball games with friends. The only things they bring to the table are that they were a part of the current world record and that they really, really want to help out.

Jacque Ruby, the brain behind the world record attempt, is not denying the fact that he initially thought of this because he also wants his name in the record books.

“I want to be part of history. I want to become a Guinness World Record holder. Originally, that was the idea,” said Ruby as the game clock read seven hours.

No one can blame him for wanting it. I wanted that too. I scoured those yearly Guinness Book of World Record looking for something that I could do.

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“But now, it’s much more than that,” Ruby clarified. “Now it’s about helping out. We will be helping through Gawad Kalinga’s OPLAN Walang Iwanan. It’s a community in the Visayas that they’re trying to rebuild. Through this awareness campaign, we’re hoping to raise funds and build a community of 22 houses and a basketball court. The Americans playing right now also did some fund-raising activities in the States and they will turnover the money to Gawad Kalinga after the game.”

The organizers received more than 330,000 applications to be a part of the two teams. They called for two tryouts, which brought the applicants down to 100. Panel interviews and medical examinations were then held before the 24 players were named.

To put things into perspective, PBA teams are allowed to have 15 players in their lineups. They play a total of 48 minutes in one game and they spend an incredible amount of time off with dead ball situations, timeouts, complaining to the referees, halftime breaks, video reviews, partials walkouts, and what-not. The 24 players involved in this game have none of that.

They will play straight with no breaks. They are not even allowed to speak with the media or their families. They’re not even allowed to complain to the referees. The group is targeting five days to beat the record and for that duration, the players will call the Meralco Gym their home.

Among the players, Maricar Convencido, a 29-year-old Physical Education teacher, sticks out because she’s the only female in the group. She did not make it to the lineup as a token female.

“She’s not the greatest of basketball players, even for women, but we saw during training that she’ll never give up,” Ruby said. “She never asked for special treatment.”

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The group of 24 players came from all walks of life. Some played wearing their brand new Durants and Jordans but there were some who balled in running shoes.

“Of course it helps that you’re physically fit and you have basketball IQ but the primary trait we were looking for was mental toughness,” Ruby said. “The true test will be tonight and the days after. Right now they’re still running on adrenalin, pero pagdating ng third, fourth and fifth days, it will be really tough.”

“I hope the PBA players come over to show their support, even the players from Gilas,” Ruby pleaded. “We’re doing this for a cause and I’m sure their presence will inspire our players to go on.”

The ongoing basketball marathon is important because it’s another opportunity for us Filipinos to show the world just how crazy we are about basketball. But more than that, it’s an opportunity to help out. Twenty two families will get a golden shot at restarting their lives that Yolanda put on hold.

The 24 players are doing their part. You can help them out by dropping by and cheering them on.