Pinoy ref makes FIBA World Cup KO stage

MADRID – Gilas Pilipinas is out but the Philippines still has a representation left in the 2014 FIBA World Cup in the person of Ferdinand “Bong” Pascual who made the cut for the list of referees officiating the meet’s knockout games in this city and over in Barcelona.

Pascual, originally from Nueva Ecija now based in Valenzuela, is the lone Asian ref to officiate the big games.

The 38-man officiating roster has been trimmed down to 20, divided into two groups with Group A working the Madrid matches and Group B the Barcelona games.

From Bilbao where he officiated Group C matches involving the USA, Turkey, Ukraine, New Zealand, Dominican Republic and Finland, Pascual has moved to Barcelona, joining referees from the US, Argentina, Latvia, Serbia, Brazil, France, Greece, Spain and Angola.

To work on games in Madrid are refs from the US, Mexico, Ukraine, Italy, Croatia, Canada, Puerto Rico, Slovenia, Germany and Australia.

Pascual is the first Filipino ref to work on the men’s world basketball championship for the first time in a long, long while, one of four from Asia that made the 38-man officiating roster for the Spanish world meet.

The other Asian refs, Yuji Hirahara of Japan, Mohammad Al Amiri of Kuwait and Yevgeniy Mikheyev of Kazakhstan, failed to make the list for the knockout stage.

The 34 other refs come from 24 countries across FIBA’s four other continental zones – America, Europe, Africa and Oceania.

The group consists of tested refs with ages ranging from 27 to 50 and an average refereeing experience of 11.6 years.

Pascual, 44, a former University of Baguio Cardinal from Cabanatuan City, has been an international referee for 11 years now.