Team Philippines in the bracket of GIANTS

FIBA-Asia draw pits RP five vs heavyweights

Chot Reyes: ‘We’re in the group of death’
By Musong R. Castillo
Inquirer


MANILA, Philippines -- Morbid though it may sound, but Chot Reyes picked the perfect words to describe the latest turn of events in Philippine basketball.

“We’re in the group of death,” Reyes told the Philippine Daily Inquirer over the phone, a few minutes after learning where Team Philippines landed after the FIBA-Asia championship draw Wednesday in Japan.

“We’re in the worst position we could be in,” continued Reyes. “We drew the biggest and best teams in the (Asian) region.”

There was no luck in the draw for the Filipinos after they found themselves in the bracket of no less than mighty China and rock-solid Jordan and Iran in Group A, making survival of the eliminations a tough feat in itself.

“The good thing about it is that if we survive the eliminations, the quarterfinals will be relatively easy,” Reyes said.

“You work so hard only to leave your fate to the luck of the draw,” he continued. “This (RP) team and this country have come too far to be denied. We will go to Beijing or we will die trying.”

Tournament format will call for the top two finishers in each of the four groups to march on to the quarterfinals, where another set of knockout matches will be held to determine the Final Four.

Technically, the tournament will only stake one slot to the Beijing Games, the hosts Chinese already seeded. That means that if China wins the Tokushima joust, only the second placer will go to Beijing.

Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Japan are in Group B, Qatar, India, Kazakhstan and Indonesia are in Group C and Korea, Hong Kong, Syria and Chinese-Taipei making up the final bracket.

Jordan was a solid force in the last Asian Games in Doha, Qatar, while Iran manhandled the Philippines three times in the FIBA-Asia Champions Cup recently in Tehran, Iran.

One of those games against Iran was an exhibition during a break in the Champions Cup against the real Iranian national side that played without its Champions Cup imports.

Jordan, on the other hand, reached the final four of the Asian Games in Doha, Qatar.

Reyes said that it his not his style to dwell on the negatives. He emphasized that at this point, he will focus his sights on beating Jordan and the Iranians and let China “take care of itself.”

Team Philippines, which was assembled last March after a two-year suspension by the international basketball federation (FIBA) was lifted, finished fourth in the Champions Cup but went undefeated in the Southeast Asian Basketball Association tournament in Thailand a couple of weeks back.

Reyes still has two international tournaments to play in before flying to Japan for the FIBA-Asia next month.

Source: Inquirer.net