Thailand - RP women's basketball team a cinch for SEAG gold?

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As host, Thailand, as expected will do everything to win all the gold medals within its reach to ensure the Southeast Asian Games overall championship it last won in 1999 is brought back its shore.

In women's basketball, for instance, the Thai Games Organizing Committee had to alter the schedule of games twice in two days in an apparent effort to scuttle the strongest challenge their team's chief rivals, especially the resurgent Philippine team, can put up.

The Filipinas who were to start their campaign against Thailand tomorrow, found Gaston jittery, such an encounter had been re-scheduled for Friday.

The Filipinas and the Singaporeans battle each other at 1 p.m. (2 p.m. in Manila), with the latter reportedly recalled back the four players from Mainland China, which beefed up the team in previous international meets in the hope of fashioning out a decent performance here.

Earlier last Wednesday, the Games organizers, thinking that the Thai cagebelles can easily repeat the drubbing they dealt the Filipinas in the gold medal play of the recent Southeast Asian Basketball Association championship, the basketball tournament committee had earlier pitted the host country's team against the Philippines in their initial outings on Saturday.

Learning its lesson for that setback, the Basketball Association-Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas, however, decided to beef up that SEABA runner up squad with what national head coach Fritz Gaston thought the girls needed to bring home the bacon this time, which will be a first in Philippine women's basketball history.

A move that led the host to change the schedule and pit the Filipinas against Singapore instead, obviously for the purpose of scouting Melisa Jacob and Amira Issa, a pair of Fil-Americans, and Fats Tolentino, the three reinforcements Gaston added on the lineup, precisely to patch up the frontline leak spotted in the RP SEABA Five.

Jacob is a 5-foot-9 guard who played for the University of California-Irvine, Isas a 6-3 behemoth from North Carolina, and Tolentino, a 5-11 center from the University of the Philippines.

The Thais, naturally, draw a bye on the day the Filipinas and the Singaporean cancel each other out before facing the Filipinas on Sunday.

The hosts, likewise, rest on Dec. 12, the day the Philippines and Malaysia square off, again, to make sure the strongest pursuers would tire out before battling the Malaysians.

"Well, that's a prerogative ttat belongs to the host country. We can't do anything about that, hindi naman ipinagbabawal yan," Gaston could only sigh when he learned of the situation.

"What we should do is play the way we should and try to sweep the one-round tournament to assure that the gold medal will be awarded to us," said Gaston.

Leading the Filipinas campaign are team captain Emilia Vega (5-6), the girl who also presided over another RP team's SEA Games silver medal finish in nearby Chiang Mai in 1995, Fil-Am Vicki Brick (5-7), Cassy Tioseco of Ateneo (6-1), the UAAP MPV, and her WNCAA counterpart Chiko Matsuno of Lyceum (5-11).

Rounding up Gaston's roster are John Ford Grajales (5-4) and Pixie Valencia (5-7) of Iloilo, Diane Jose (5-9) and Ace Adriano (5-8) of Far Eastern U and May Narciza of Adamson U (5-9).

"The team has never been so solid and I believe the girls have what it takes to give everybody a run for their money, including our hosts,"Gaston declared, adding that even castoffs Pipay Villanjueva, Kristine Chua, Ewon Arayi and Chobi Borja showed no hard feelings with the change in the line up.

With an average height of 5-9, the team emerges as the tallest national squad the country is fielding in an international competitions.