#TBT: 'When you play Gilas, you play against a country'

Just before Gilas Pilipinas takes on the world at the 2014 FIBA Basketball World Cup this Saturday, here's a throwback piece I wrote when I was working as a liaison officer at the 2013 FIBA Asia Championships.

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FOR many years now, it has been said that Philippines is a basketball-crazy country. It’s hard to see what that means until you see it with your eyes.

The decision to hold the 27th FIBA Asia Championship here on our home turf was such a monumental step for the basketball followers of this nation. All 90-plus million buzzed and dreamed big for our national team, the Gilas Pilipinas.

It’s not just going to be a home court advantage for our boys, the games will be played in the Filipino home court, an environment like no other.

We shout whenever our team is up and are making baskets. We boo almost everything in the court even though the opposing teams haven’t done anything yet. We react to bad calls, missed calls, and calls that make us scratch our heads. It is that kind of an unforgiving atmosphere that can really send chills down the spine for the guys on the other side of the floor.

Achieving the dream of winning a ticket to the 2014 FIBA Basketball World Cup to be played in Spain from Aug 30 to Sept 14 next year was just the icing on the cake for all the thousands who made it to the Mall of Asia Arena, and many more thousands who missed it.

Whether it may be filing in long queues just to buy the hottest ticket in town – an incomparable chance to see our national team tussle it out with the giants in Asia here on our land, or may it be doing the Mexican wave electrifying the crowd and being the most imposing sixth man on the floor, the Filipinos have done it, willing the team to remember their battle cry going into this tourney which is “para sa bayan (for the country)”.

We smiled whenever coach Chot Reyes strut down the court with his colorful polos. We shouted every single time LA Tenorio and Jayson Castro William outsmarted bigger guys and made baskets on their fearless drives. We gasped when Marcus Douthit limped down the floor. We went loud in every Japeth Aguilar dunk. We soaked Gary David with cheers of his name, willing him to deliver – and he did. We were left in awe when Gabe Norwood shut down the team’s best offensive threat. We watched all those long bombs from Jeff Chan, Larry Fonacier, and Jimmy Alapag from their hands through the air and through the net, then we went bananas.

Most importantly, we cried when they won.

That’s why almost 20,000 strong Filipinos rocked the Mall of Asia Arena every time the Philippines took the court. It was such a rare moment that Filipinos of all shapes and sizes – a hodgepodge of diverse cultures based on different influences all in the past, have come together and united as one.

We always were a basketball-crazy country. We cheered “Gi-ne-bra!” for one of the most popular ballclub in the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA).

But this? Singing your hearts out for your country right in front of our very eyes with the chance to be tagged as an Asian royalty after long years of wait?

This is just priceless. It’s incomparable!

As they say, to see is to believe, and you haven’t seen how big basketball is to the Filipinos until you become a part of it.

Coach Chot Reyes said it best. “When you play Gilas Pilipinas, you don’t just play against a team. You play against a country.”