By REYNALD MAGALLON
It wasn’t only the slow start that had been haunting Gilas Pilipinas through its first two games in the 2025 FIBA Asia Cup in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
A more baffling – and perhaps, even more pressing – matter was the Nationals’ ability – or inability – to defend the three-point line.
“Chinese Taipei shot very well from the three and tonight they shot very well from the three so that’s something we’ve got to try to solve and get better at going into our next game and through the tournament,” said Gilas head coach Tim Cone.
Through the two losses, Gilas struggled defending the opponents’ hot shooting from deep. Chinese Taipei nailed 12 triples in its 95-87 victory over the Filipinos while New Zealand knocked down 13 triples on its way to a 94-86 triumph against Gilas.
Opponents were shooting an average of 47.2 percent from deep when defended by Gilas.
Ying-Chun Chen of Chinese Taipei torched Gilas with six triples to finish with 34 points in the first while Jordan Ngatai gave the same challenge to the Gilas defense when he shot a perfect 5-of-5 clip from deep.
“We just have to identify shooters a little better. We didn’t do that very well in the first half.
I thought we did a much better job in the second half,” Cone said.
“Ngatai really had some open looks early in the first half and we knew coming out he was going to be a shooter and we had to cover him and we still didn’t cover him,” he lamented.
More than tweaking Gilas defensive schemes, however, Cone stressed that solving the puzzle lies on the mindset of the players.
“These are just, to me, just more mental adjustments than anything else and just something we’ve got to continue to talk about and work on and try to figure out why teams are shooting so well,” he added.
“It’s all going to be about mental, getting loose balls, getting loose rebounds and not allowing the extra possessions to get three-point shots up,” he added.
