By REYNALD MAGALLON
BANGKOK – To say that the 33rd Southeast Asian Games basketball gold is the hardest for Gilas Pilipinas is a huge understatement.
For national team head coach Norman Black, being thrusted to the competition with barely a day to practice and a team to work with was an extremely difficult task.
“This has been a really difficult journey. You guys don’t really realize,” said Black after the Nationals bagged the gold in the men’s 5-on-5 basketball after an emotional 70-64 win over Thailand.
Ever since getting notified that he’ll be coaching the SEA Games team, Black mapped out the plans for the national team as early as September.
But the Thailand organizing committee went back-and-forth with its decision on its eligibility rule — seemingly an effort to derail the Nationals’ preparation for the Games.
“I know I shut down the media a little bit, and I didn’t talk because every time I would say something, it seemed like the organizing committee would change the rules. So I decided I wasn’t going to mention anything publicly anymore because they’re using our information against us,” said Black.
It was only until the team landed in the Thai capital that they finally had a full practice together – just a day before its opening game.
“I went four months not knowing what the rules were, not knowing what the eligibility rules were. I formed a team, only to be told I couldn’t use that team, and then when I formed another team, I was told I couldn’t use certain players,” he lamented.
But whatever trick the host has in its back, it can’t simply put a good team down.
Though marked with anxious starts and sporadic offense, the Nationals were resilient as they powered through the struggles and defeated Thailand, a team that has been blowing out opponents, right on its home turf.
“When you’ve gone through what we’ve gone through to get up to this point, adversity doesn’t seem that hard,” said Black as his team had to recover from a 13-point deficit against the Thais.
“You basically just go out and fight and pull together. In our case, our offense was not very good,” he added.
“We couldn’t really shoot the ball that well, so we figured we would just play defense and try to get up some stops. Luckily for us, down the stretch, they missed some foul shots that helped us along the way, and that’s the reason why we came out on top.”
