TIM Cone has put together a 12-man lineup filled with surprise choices for Gilas Pilipinas' campaign in the 19th Asian Games in Hangzhou, China in two weeks' time.
Magnolia's enigmatic forward Calvin Abueva and flamboyant San Miguel guard Terrence Romeo lead the new faces and returnees in a Gilas lineup that had to be reassembled after Chot Reyes resigned as coach at the end of the Fiba World Cup.
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World Cup veterans June Mar Fajardo, Japeth Aguilar, RR Pogoy and Scottie Thompson, naturalized players Justin Brownlee and Ange Kouame, and World Cup pool members Chris Newsome and Calvin Oftana were also in the pool.
Aside from Abueva and Romeo, the other new additions who showed up for the first day of practice at the PhilSports Arena were Jason Perkins, and Mo Tautuaa.
"Yeah, this is our group. This is what we want to go with," said Cone after practice at the Philsports Arena when asked if this is his final 12 that will go to war in China.
"This is our 12."
Ginebra guard Stanley Pringle was also at practice but his status at the moment is the team's alternate - the 13th man, according to Cone.
"He’s an alternate. If anything happens, he’ll be one of the guys that we’ll place in the lineup or in case somebody gets injured as such," said Cone of the 36-year-old Pringle.
Cone addded Pringle was included in the huge 60-man list the team submitted to the Hangzhou Asian Games Organizing Committee, making it easy for him to be inserted in the final roster if ever a player won't be available at the last minute.
In all, there are seven players from the SMC group whose own sports director Alfrancis Chua sits as team manager; three from the MVP camp and only one player who doesn't belong to the two groups in Phoenix's Perkins.
But Cone is satisfied with what he had on the table.
"I'm good. I'm good at what we got. I think we got a good balance of size, of quickness at the 3 and 4, and we got good guards, we got shooters. We're pretty well-equiped," he said.
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