SO near, yet so far.
That’s what Gilas Pilipinas coach Tim Cone felt after seeing the Philippine team suffer a heartbreaking 106-102 loss to New Zealand in their FIBA World Cup 2027 Asian Qualifiers on Friday at the Spark Arena in Auckland.
The Filipinos fought with all their might, led by youngsters Juan Gomez De Llano, Kevin Quiambao and Carl Tamayo, who surprisingly carried the scoring cudgels all game long as naturalized player Justin Brownlee was held down to just five points on mere three attempts.
In the end, while Gilas gave itself several chances, the last with a 104-100 lead, the national side succumbed to New Zealand’s endgame charge, leading to its third straight loss in the window 3 of the Asian Qualifiers.
“We missed some free throws, probably fouled a few times that we shouldn’t have, and that was really the story of the game,” said Cone, whose Gilas side dropped to 2-3 overall.
“We had chances in both regulation and in the first overtime to win that basketball game, but we just came up short.”
While Gilas engaged New Zealand in a tight contest, the Filipinos were the first to blink, making crucial turnovers, while Brownlee eventually whistled for his fifth and final foul, that was deemed an unsportsmanlike infraction, heading into the final 62 seconds.
It was downhill from there.
Gomez De Liano, RJ Abarrientos, Brownlee and Dwight Ramos combined for 13 of Gilas’ 20 turnovers, miscues that the Tall Blacks were able to capitalize in the critical juncture to pull off their third straight win and successfully protect their homecourt.
“It would have been nice to come down here and steal a game. That would have been special,” said Cone, as he expressed his disappointment in failing to get the win for a fair-sized Filipino community that supported them at the Spark Arena. “The fact that we got to as close as we did, obviously is a huge disappointment. Once you feel like it’s in your grasp, and let it slip away, it makes it tough.”
If there’s any silver lining in Gilas’ narrow loss, it’s the fact that Gomez De Liano, Quiambao and Tamayo showed vast improvement after managing to fight toe to toe against the more experienced Tall Blacks.
And that, for Cone was a “win” in itself.
“Bottomline was, our guys came to play. They expended an incredible amount of energy just keeping and staying in the game,” noted Cone.
“(We) Went down by 11 or 12 points early in the game, we battled back, got ahead by seven, I think, but again we just couldn’t hold it.”
Gilas will try to pick up the pieces from its “near win” versus New Zealand as the Philippines travels to Perth this weekend in time for its big showdown against world No. 6 Australia in Perth.
RICHARD DY