PBA board okays 17-man Gilas pool for Olympic qualifiers

MANILA, Philippines – The PBA board of governors unanimously approved a resolution Wednesday, releasing 17 players to the Philippine national pool for one of the three Olympic world qualifiers next year.

Calvin Abueva, Gabe Norwood, Jayson Castro, Ranidel de Ocampo, Matt Ganuelas-Rosser, Marc Pingris, Terrence Romeo are holdovers from the Gilas team to the recent Changsha meet to be joined in by Junmar Fajardo, Marcio Lassiter, Japeth Aguilar, LA Tenorio, Greg Slaughter, Jeff Chan, Paul Lee, Ryan Reyes, Troy Rosario and Ian Sangalang.

All have been Gilas players at one time or another except Reyes, Rosario and Sangalang.

Lassiter, Aguilar and Slaughter were part of the original Gilas team under coach Rajko Toroman.

Fajardo, Tenorio, Aguilar, Chan, Lee, meanwhile, will be returnees from the Gilas team that competed in the 2014 World Cup and in the 2014 Incheon Asian Games.

Reyes was a member of the Powerade Phl team to the 2009 FIBA Asia Championship in Tianjin while Rosario and Sanggalang have played for the national team in the SEA Games. Rosario has also served as an alternate in the recent Changsha joust.

The PBA board showed a united front in announcing the result of their special meeting Wednesday at the PBA office in Libis, Quezon City.

“The PBA commits to fully support the formation of the Philippine national team that will participate in the wildcard Olympic qualifying tournament on July 5-10,” said board chairman Robert Non in the presence of all members of the board, commissioner Chito Narvasa and president/CEO Chito Salud.

In the same meeting, they formed an ad hoc committee that will help each other to ensure the participation of the individual players to the pool.

Named to the adhoc committee are Ginebra’s Alfrancis Chua, Talk n Text’s Patrick Gregorio, Rain or Shine’s Mert Mondragon and the league commissioner.

“The PBA has approved the participation of all the players. As for the players, it’s the ad hoc committee’s task to get their nod,” said Non.

The board agreed to lend players and at the same time adjust its season calendar to accommodate training and actual participation of Gilas to the Olympic qualifier.

“The PBA is adjusting the third conference which shall start after the end of the qualifying tournament on July 10, 2016,” said Non.

“The PBA shall allow the PBA players so selected to attend practice sessions once a week, specifically every Monday for 28 weeks starting November, 2015,” Non added.