JUNE Mar Fajardo and Cjay Perez of San Miguel, and Calvin Oftana of TNT have been excused from Gilas Pilipinas practices due to the PBA 49th Season Philippine Cup finals.
The three were not around when Gilas began the week with a morning practice on Monday at The Upper Deck. Eight players were present including naturalized player Justin Brownlee, who recently arrived in the country to join the preparations for the FIBA Asia Cup.
READ: Fit-again Justin Brownlee back in PH for Gilas Asia Cup bid
Also present were Dwight Ramos, Carl Tamayo, AJ Edu, Chris Newsome, Jamie Malonzo, Troy Rosario, and Scottie Thompson, although Thompson was in civilian clothes as he heals from his hamstring injury.
TNT and San Miguel are battling for the PBA Philippine Cup finals with the Tropang 5G gaining first blood with a 99-96 win in Game 1.
“Until after the finals,” said Gilas Pilipinas coach Tim Cone after Monday’s practice.
“What can we do. We can’t have them here. I know how worrying it is to be in the finals and then having to go to other practices. It’s not going to work. It’s not going to be fair to [the] other team since they are the stars of the team.”
Cone is the least concerned with their absences since the Gilas program was designed to bring in a lean pool in order for the players to get accustomed with the system.
“We will piecemeal without it. Remember, we’ve had these guys in the past already. June Mar, we’ve had Cjay. We’ve had Calvin. And they are going to be in shape. In fact, they are going to be overshaped. When they walk in, they should pretty much know what we are doing. We’ll try to catch them up in anything new that we’ve done,” said Cone.
“But the bottomline is this is why we are not bringing in new guys. When the group is all together, they are already intact in terms of knowledge and knowing each other and knowing the system. It’s all about moving forward, not stopping and going, stopping and going. This is the way the system has been designed to account for this kind of stuff that happens,” he continued.
“In the meantime, we will continue to practice our core and get these guys as ready as we can."
Gilas Pilipinas will be conducting daily practices this week as part of the preparations for the FIBA Asia Cup.
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