Jakarta—The Philippine basketball team wants no less than an emphatic win against Syria to end their roller-coaster campaign on a high in the 2018 Asian Games here.
A win will give the hastily-formed Rain or Shine-bannered team here fifth place, which will improve the seventh rank of the Andray Blatche-reinforced Gilas Pilipinas team four years ago during the Incheon games.
Gametime is 6:30 pm (7:30 pm in Manila) at the Gelora Bung Karno Basketball Hall here.
For head coach Yeng Guiao, capping the team’s campaign here with a big win would be a nice gift to basketball-loving Filipinos, who were taken aback by the suspensions handed on Gilas Pilipinas players and coaches following their brawl-marred game against Australia during their Fiba World Qualifier.
“We didn’t practice on Wednesday, but we still did a lot of work viewing Syria’s games and broken down some clips. We looked at every advantage we can exploit against them. We want to make a good lasting impression in our final game in the Asian Games,” said Guiao.
The Syrians are coming off a 76-66 win over the host Indonesians Tuesday to set up the clash with the Philippines, which manhandled Japan, 113-80, on the same day.
Unlike China’s speed and size and Korea’s outside shooting, the Syrians don’t pose much of a threat to the Jordan Clarkson-led nationals, but the team still went through a two-hour practice on Thursday at the GOR Cempaka Putih, more than an hour from the Athletes’ Village to solidify their plays.
“We couldn’t ask anything more from the players,” said Guiao, back coaching in the international scene nine years since guiding the Powerade Pilipinas squad to a seventh-place finish in the 2009 FIBA Asia Championship at a time when the PBA-backed squad has no naturalized player reinforcing the squad.
This time around, Guiao boasts of a legitimate NBA player in Clarkson, who he says is the best player in these games.
The fiery NLEX mentor has also been able to bring the best out of Stanley Pringle, Christian Standhardinger and even Poy Erram in the quadrennial meet’s basketball event.
“We’ve seen how Jordan can explode at any given time, but we’ve also seen how efficient he could become if he will get his teammates more involved. We saw how Standhardinger, Erram, Pringle and Paul Lee contributed to our last two wins and we’ll do the same against Syria,” added Guiao.