Justin Brownlee leads Gilas Pilipinas’ rout of host Latvia to open the Filipinos’ Fiba OQT marketing campaign. –FIBA PHOTO
SCHEDULE: Gilas Pilipinas at Fiba OQT in Riga, Latvia
Gilas Pilipinas pounced on Latvia’s early taking pictures woes and performed with steely nerves down the stretch to topple World No. 6 and host Latvia, 89-80, within the Fiba Olympic Qualifying Event (OQT) on Thursday.
The No. 37-ranked Filipinos, overwhelming underdogs within the quick meet at Enviornment Riga that may ship a winner to the Paris Olympics, raced to an 8-0 begin and constructed a large cushion that they by no means yielded till the ultimate horn.
“I’m completely shocked to be sitting in entrance of you guys after successful this basketball sport. This isn’t one thing we thought we have been gonna do, I’ll be trustworthy with you,” stated Gilas coach Tim Cone after the Philippines beat a European workforce for the primary time in 64 years.
“We needed to come back in and compete and actually placed on a very good present. We received began early. We hit photographs early. And fortunately Latvia missed photographs.”
Naturalized ace Justin Brownlee delivered a close to triple-double of 26 factors, 9 rebounds, and 9 assists, whereas younger cornerstones Kai Sotto and Dwight Ramos tossed in 18 and 11 factors, respectively, for a triumph that received Gilas’ marketing campaign off to a rousing begin.
READ: Tim Cone dismisses notion that Gilas not huge, quick, sturdy sufficient
Barring a large blowout by the hands of World No. 23 Georgia, the Philippines is on observe to advance to the crossover knockout section which might pit the Filipinos in opposition to Cameroon, Brazil or Montenegro.
Chris Newsome scored 10 factors, together with a few late baskets within the ultimate interval that saved the Latvians at bay with the outcomes considerably shaking up the Group A race.
Gilas Pilipinas’ Kai Sotto among the many high performers in opposition to Latvia within the Fiba OQT. –FIBA BASKETBALL
The Latvians, having received 24 of their final 27 Fiba video games, have been projected to brush the preliminaries, however struggled in opposition to a decided Gilas aspect and dropped to 1-1 within the OQT.
It additionally didn’t assist the hosts that their exterior taking pictures deserted them simply because the Filipinos hit theirs. Latvia was 10-for-42 whereas Gilas wound up 9-of-20 from deep.
“There have been a few stretches, like Kai stated, that we form of misplaced our method a bit bit however it looks as if when Latvia was nearly able to make enormous run at us, they’d miss an open three-point shot,” Cone stated.
“And that’s simply a kind of night time for Latvia—they only received’t hit photographs tonight.”
Rodions Kurucs and Rolands Smits joined arms for a last-ditch effort for the Latvians, however the Gilas cushion—which swelled to as huge as 26 factors—proved too huge to overtake.
READ: Tim Cone ‘not happy’ till Gilas reaches optimum FIBA OQT type
Kurucs had 18 factors, Davis Bertans, Kristers Zoriks and Janis Strelnieks 10 every whereas Smits had 9 within the Latvian effort that left many within the residence crowd in disbelief.
Gilas and Georgia tangle in 18 hours (8:30 p.m. Manila time) on the similar venue.
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