Dwight Ramos high on Gilas future

MANILA, Philippines — The future is bright for Gilas Pilipinas, guard Dwight Ramos said, after the Nationals’ overachieving feat at the FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournament (OQT) in Riga, Latvia last week.

Gilas bowed out of the qualifiers in the semifinals, which shook the basketball world.

The Philippines started the OQT with a rout over hosts and World No. 6 Latvia. They then lost by two points against World No. 23 Georgia by two points, which pushed them to the semifinals of the tournament.

In the final four, Gilas was overmatched by Brazil, who went on to punch a ticket to the Paris Olympics.

Ramos, who played a pivotal role for the depleted Philippine side, said Gilas’ future is “super bright”.

“We still have a bunch of years until the World Cup, and we really only practiced for four days before we left [for Europe],” the 25-year-old guard said at the sidelines of Lawson’s fan event on Friday at One Ayala in Makati.

“So, four days of practice, we still made it to the semis.”

Before leaving for Europe, the Philippines had only a few days to practice before going up against the Taiwan Mustangs at home for a tuneup match.

They then lost both friendlies against Turkiye and Poland before heading into the OQT.

In the same interview, Ramos said that Gilas’ win over Latvia is probably the best victory of his young basketball career thus far.

“The win is like the best win in my career, that’s what it felt like and I think a lot of people thought we won’t get into the semis,” he stressed.

Despite this, he bared that they felt they should have gone to the Olympics.

“But after we lost the game against Brazil, it felt like we should have won the whole tournament so it still felt like a disappointment for us,” he added.

Gilas’ win over Latvia is the Philippines’ first triumph over a European team since the 1960 Olympic games, when they beat Spain, 84-82.

“It’s a big thing, something to look back on, for sure, but I hope there was more to it.”