GILAS Pilipinas continued its buildup for the Southeast Asian Games on Tuesday with rare back-to-back training sessions for a national side that’s hampered by manpower issues.
Gilas Pilipinas buildup
After holding a practice on Monday morning, 10 players showed up at the Meralco gym in Pasig for the Tuesday night session supervised by national coach Chot Reyes, giving them enough players to play 5-on-5.
San Miguel stars CJ Perez and Chris Ross, Chris Newsome and Aaron Black of Meralco, NorthPort’s Arvin Tolentino, and Brandon Ganuelas-Rosser and Sean Anthony of NLEX were the PBA players in attendance.
College standouts Mason Amos and Phillips brothers Michael and Ben rounded out the players in the attendance.
Out of the 11 players who showed up on Monday morning, only Marcio Lassiter was not around this time as the SMB sniper had to leave for the US for one week.
Still, Reyes is glad to see some development by having back-to-back practices.
“That’s a luxury," the veteran coach said. "We get every opportunity that we have na makaka-sampu then we’ll go out and get a practice in."
Gilas, though, is scheduling its next practice next week.
"But at least, we’re already able to put in some offensive things, defensive concepts, and there’s some real progress that’s being made," Reyes said. "But we’re still very far off from where we want to be."
Gilas assistant coach Jong Uichico taught defensive schemes that the national pool simulated in a half-court setting, then applied in their scrimmage.
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