Gilas Pilipinas’ bid to defend their Asian Games basketball crown ended in heartbreak as China crushed them, 105-61, in Nagoya, Japan. The setback dashed the Philippines’ hopes of making the last eight and ended their campaign in ninth place overall.
The defeat also had a symbolic significance. The Philippines, led by naturalized player Justin Brownlee, shocked China four years ago in Hangzhou with a stunning comeback victory, erasing a 20-point deficit to take a 77-76 win en route to the gold medal. The all-Filipino team of coach Tim Cone could not duplicate that magic this time without Brownlee. “It was pretty much a miracle win against China four years ago. We need another miracle here. That never happened,” Cone said.
The loss was so great it made matters worse. The Philippines had to lose by no more than 37 points to qualify as one of the two best third place teams. Instead they fell short by 44 missing the cut. Jordan and Saudi Arabia took the other quarterfinal spots on point-differential superiority. Cone said his team was not intentionally playing for the score gap: “Our intention was to come out and play our best and try to win rather than play for the quotient.
The loss is now one of the worst in Philippine basketball history. It is the team’s worst Asian Games performance, bettering a seventh place finish in 2014. It was the country’s worst Asiad defeat since a 125-60 drubbing by China in 1990 and the worst loss for any Gilas team since a 126-67 massacre by Serbia at the 2019 FIBA World Cup.
Philippine Olympic Committee president Abraham Tolentino said it will now be a five-year wait for another chance at gold as the Asian Games will shift to odd years starting in 2031. He also expressed concern about the country’s dependence on a narrower pool of naturalized players than other countries. “Why do other countries have so many naturalized players? “Why not?” he said. “Why can’t we?”
But it wasn’t all bad news for Team Philippines in the early days of the Games. The Filipinas women’s football team picked up a hard-fought point in Gifu City, drawing 1-1 with Uzbekistan. Uzbekistan went ahead in the 81st minute but Natalie Collins, 19, grabbed a last-minute equalizer with a minute left on the clock. Next up for the team is Hong Kong on September 17.
