HANGZHOU – A brutal schedule awaits Gilas Pilipinas should it take care of business against Qatar on Monday in the 19th Asian Games.
While a win over the Qataris will send the national team to the quarterfinal round, it plays Group A top seed Iran the following day at 12 noon.
READ: Tim Cone yearns for another shot at RHJ, Jordan
More or less, that would mean just about an 18 hour rest in between the Qatar and Iran games.
Even more, the semifinals is set to be played on Wednesday against either South Korea or defending champion China, meaning three games in four days for Gilas should it go that deep in the tournament.
The gold medal game is set Friday.
Of course, everything depends on the outcome of Gilas’ game against the Qataris, set at 4 p.m. at the Zijingang gymnasium at the Zhejiang University.
“We gotta get Qatar, which we feel we could beat,” said Gilas coach Tim Cone. “And then we gonna go after Iran. I think we got a good shot at beating Iran, and that’ll take us to the Final Four.
“Then we’re gonna look at China and Korea. Hopefully we can find a way to put a good game together there (in the semis) against either team.”
Gilas Pilipinas could have avoided going through the tough schedule had it beat Jordan for the top spot in Pool C.
READ: Jordan deals Gilas a beating
Unfortunately, that didn’t happen as Rondae Hollis-Jefferson and Jordan dealt the Filipinos an 87-62 beating to relegate Gilas to the classification for the quarterfinals.
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