Gilas Pilipinas wins over Ukraine U-20 in tuneup, but Chot Reyes says it was ‘worst’ game in recent friendlies

The Philippine nationwide males’s basketball staff gained towards the Ukraine Under-20 staff, 70-61, on Saturday in Lithuania, however head coach Chot Reyes described the sport as Gilas Pilipinas’ worst, regardless of it being their first victory in a sequence of friendlies in Europe.

For Reyes, the staff nonetheless had defensive lapses they wanted to work on.

“To be very honest, I was very pleased with how quickly we picked up the new things that we worked on yesterday in practice. But to be very honest, although we won this game, I still think there were a lot of defensive lapses,” Reyes mentioned in an interview on the nationwide staff’s Facebook web page.

“If I were to rate it, I think this is the worst game since the start. I know this is the game that we won but I thought there was a lot more to be desired.”

Reyes additionally admitted that lacking the providers of Scottie Thompson and Chris Newsome affected their sport.

“Still, in our overall journey in the process, we focused on cutting down our turnovers, not giving up offensive rebounds, and being able to execute the defense we worked on yesterday. I think we were able to do that.”

Prior to the sport towards Ukraine, the nationwide staff misplaced to Estonia and Finland.

The Philippines will host the FIBA World Cup, together with Japan and Indonesia, on August 25 to September 10.

Gilas will play Angola, Dominican Republic, and Italy within the group stage of the event.

—JKC, GMA Integrated News