WE won this one
Yes, definitely, we won this one.
And there’s no better way to cap our campaign to win the overall championship in the recently concluded 30th Southeast Asian Games (SEAG) that we hosted than winning both the men’s and women’s basketball gold medals before a roaring crowd at the Mall of Asia Arena.
After all, this is the sport that matters to most Filipinos and a loss in the men’s side would have been termed as a major disaster even if we still win the overall crown.
Actually, it is a given that Gilas Pilipinas, composed of PBA superstars and near stars, would claim the crown even before the tournament started. The only question is what team would face us in the finals and how many points would be the margin of victory.
I made sure I was at the MOA Arena to watch both games.
Thailand gave us a good fight up to the first half but collapsed in the third quarter as Gilas exploded and that was it. We just waited for the final buzzer to sound with the locals winning by 34 points.
It was the women’s division that I am excited to see. We made history as the Pat Aquino-mentored team took the early lead and never looked back en route to a 20-point victory for our very first gold medal in the SEA Games.
Salute to the girls particularly Jack Animam, reed thin Janine Pontejos, Afril Bernardino, and my favorite point guard Chack Cabinbin who held the team together throughout the game, and as Pat expressed at the media interview, the hope is women’s basketball will rise to the next level and build on this recent golden performance in the SEAG.
The Philippines led with a total of 149 golds, the most it has won in SEAG history. PH also bagged 117 silvers and 121 bronzes.
A far second was Vietnam with a 98 golds, 85 silvers and 105 bronzes medal count while Thailand was a close third with only 92 golds but with more silvers and bronzes than Vietnam at 103 and 123, respectively.
Am I happy with our performance?
Who would not be?
Our athletes gave it their best shot. The Philippine Sports Commission (PSC) gave them the training they need abroad. And most importantly, the ordinary people came out in droves to cheer them on that non-mainstream sports like fencing or soft tennis, even men’s volleyball, which surprised everyone by getting a silver after booting out defending champions Thailand, found themselves in a new situation of having crowds supporting them in the venues.
The SEAG was indeed, as pointed out by PSC chairman Butch Ramirez, was a unifying factor for the country that even for that particular period only from November 30 to December 11, the criticisms and negativity practically disappeared as the athletes started winning golds right from Day 1 with triathlon leading the way.
Yes, we needed the SEA Games if only to deflect from the high degree of politicization in our country. It is only right that they get what they deserve as incentives, increased further by President Rodrigo Duterte, to his credit, and definitely, it will be a “Merry Christmas” indeed for a lot of our athletes and coaches as they have hundreds of thousands, maybe even a million or so reasons to be happy.
Looking back, I was wrong. And I am glad to have been proven wrong by our athletes. In my previous column, I said 120 golds will be a stretch goal already for Team Philippines but we reached 149, and my beef then was only the too high predictions of 180 to 220 gold medals bandied about by some NSA heads. That was my only issue and it was not against the athletes but more as criticism of sports officials who would predict much and end up with a litany of reasons for failing.
But this time, most of our teams delivered with arnis getting the highest number of golds but then what could we have expected from a sport that is clearly ours.
Athletics, for once, matched the end with their prediction of a high of 12 golds as they got 11, and dance sports with 10 golds, though honestly, I still have a hard time accepting it as a real sport the way I woke up to what sports is. That’s the same with e-sports which got three golds but I still would not agree that it is a legitimate sport.
Martial arts as expected delivered, from the 8 golds in taekwondo, 7 in boxing, 7 in wushu and 5 in juijitsu while others gave a gold or two like wrestling, kickboxing which actually had 3, and, karatedo, even sepak takraw, for the first time got 2 golds, triathlon did Tom Carrasco proud, getting 4 of 6 golds at stake.
Skateboarding, by the way, got 6, billiards had 4 but not courtesy of Efren “Bata” Reyes who at 65 has definitely seen his prime. Whatever happens, Bata’s position in our sports history will always be there.
A disappointment was dragon boat which I thought would deliver but ended up with two bronzes and that’s all. Bowling only got one silver and one bronze.
The Blu Girls delivered in an impressive manner but the Blu Boys was a disappointment, bowing down to Singapore in the finals.
I thought gymnastics was good for more than the two that it got from Caloy Yulo but maybe I put too much expectation.
Women’s volleyball ended up fourth place out of four countries, but do I blame the girls?
No, they gave it their all but I believe that with a stronger team with Jaja Santiago, Dindin Manabat and Kalei Mau, we would have been in the finals. And I heard that Jaja actually was given a clearance by her club to join the SEAG but it was LVPI that did not want to include her as it would not be fair allegedly to those who tried out.
But come on, a player of Jaja’s caliber does not need a tryout to see whether she can qualify or not in the first place, but really, politics should stop rearing its ugly head in volleyball and in sports in general.
Colleague TJ Jurado had a good idea. He counted only the golds in Olympic sports played in the SEA Games and he found out we would have finished just a gold behind Vietnam at 54 and 53.
Now that would be my real wish, that in the future, the SEA Games goes for quality rather than quantity of gold medals, maybe 80 percent Olympic sports, then it really becomes a higher level of competition.
But anyway, one can always dream. But for now, let us savor our hard earned victory, congrats to our athletes, coaches and officials.