The chants of “Defense! Defense!” from the hometown crowd started reverberating inside the Philsports Arena in Pasig in the third quarter on Friday.
Suddenly, as though transported to the past by some kind of time warp, it was 2013 all over again, with the Philippines and South Korea battling in the FIBA Asia Men’s Championship semifinals, a spot to the 2014 FIBA World Cup in Spain at stake.
Two current national players heard it that year — June Mar Fajardo and Japeth Aguilar — as part of the Gilas Pilipinas team. And so did a third — LA Tenorio — now an assistant in the staff of head coach Tim Cone.
All three responded — Fajardo and Aguilar from the playing court and Tenorio from the bench.
Their efforts, plus the collective contribution of the rest of the 12-man Gilas team, led by Justin Brownlee, who had 19 points with five rebounds in 35:18 minutes — a little longer than Cone probably intended, and Scottie Thompson (29:44) with 11 points to go with 4 rebounds and 4 assists, resulted in a scrappy 86-81 victory over the Changwon LG Sakers and their two imports, a top tier pro squad in South Korea.
Cone downplayed the victory, two days before the Nationals were to leave for the 19th Asian Games in Hangzhou, China, by saying that as good as the LG Sakers were, they are not SK’s main team.
“They are not a Korean national team. They are not a Chinese national team. They’re not Jordan,” Cone said. “But they (LG Sakers) are a good team. They got boards and they’re really big and the imports are really good and we had to battle them.
“And they should perform really well just like any other group. I believe they are the runner-up in the Korean league last year so it’s a tough team. We’ll take it for now. We got to get back. We know we got to get better.”
And perform well they, with pinpoint threes and laser-sharp passes from multiple screens and motion offense — the hallmarks of every Korean national team.
The Koreans hit 12 of 33 treys (36.4 percent) and edged the Nationals under the boards, 33-30. Turnovers, Gilas’ bane even from the FIBA World Cup, was evident with 13 (5 more than the LG Sakers), resulting into 3 more steals from the Korean side.
“In my book, we played better than I thought we would. So that’s a little scary because, again, you don’t judge it by one game. But I think, this is what was important about this game was that the players got a little belief in each other and they are starting to believe a little bit that maybe we can do something,” Cone said.
The man who led the Philippine to its last medal in the men’s basketball competition in the Asian Games — a bronze for the Centennial Team in 1998 in Bangkok — refused, however, to equate Gilas’ preparedness for the Asiad, with the opening game against Bahrain on September 26, based on one tune-up game.
“It’s dangerous to say that all together,” said Cone. “It was a morale booster just in terms of we feel like we know we can play with each other.”
Cone used all 12 players in team against the LG Sakers, including down-the-wire additions Marcio Lassiter, Chris Ross, Arvin Tolentino, Kevin Alas, and CJ Perez.
Gilas had one last walk-through practice on Saturday at the Philsports Arena before leaving on Sunday morning via a Philippine Airlines flight to Shanghai and then to Hangzhou, where the team will stay at Park Hyatt Hotel.