GILAS Pilipinas coach Tim Cone is amazed that the team will once again face New Zealand and Chinese Taipei in the group stage of the Fiba Asia Cup 2025 in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia this August.
The Philippines split its games against the two nations in the qualifying stage after winning their respective home games. Now all three are bunched together in Group D come the August 5 to 17 showpiece.
SCENARIO: Gilas risks facing Australia, Japan if it fails to top group
Cone expects another tough outing against those teams, but said the good thing is that they have faced them already.
“It’s kinda remarkable that we are back with New Zealand and Taiwan,” Cone told SPIN.ph after Barangay Ginebra’s opening win in the PBA Philippine Cup. “You get drawn, you don’t think you are going to get the same two teams that you played previously.”
The Philippines took the first assignments against Chinese Taipei, 106-53, in the February 2024 window, and New Zealand, 93-89, last November 2024, but lost to both, 91-84, and 87-70, respectively in the February 2025 window.
“Iraq is the wild card. Now, we know how well we have to play to have a chance against New Zealand. Now we are a little bit more prepared for Taiwan. They are not going to surprise us. But still, they played really, really well at home.
"So it’s obviously a challenge,” said Cone.
Cone is also not counting out Iraq - the fourth team in the bracket.
“And then, you got Iraq who is really big and strong, physically strong team. It’s not an easy group, but we have our work cut out for us either way,” said Cone.
The Gilas coach noted the importance of topping the group to avoid the top teams such as Australia and Japan come the knockout stages.
“We really need to win the group so we’ll have a better seeding unlike what happened in the Asian Games when we had to drop down, come back, and do all the top teams to make it back," said Cone. "But we will do what we will have to do."
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