The Philippine Basketball (–foul word(s) removed–)ociation Board decided to shorten the current season of the league to give the National team Gilas Pilipinas more time to prepare for the 2014 FIBA World Cup in Spain.
PBA Commissioner Chito Salud confirmed the said move and reported a target date of finishing the season, from the original August 13 to as early as July 15.
“The PBA, the team owners, and the Governors have agreed to compress the current season, shortening it from the original August 13 finish to as early as July 15,” said PBA commissioner Chito Salud. “How do we do that? We’re going to make the second and third conference finals series both best-of-five.” Salud stated.
Chot Reyes, who sent Gilas Pilipinas to runner-up in FIBA Asia, was thankful to the PBA Board for supporting the Philippine National basketball team.
“The board reiterated their full support to the Gilas program and they have very generously cut back the schedule by one month,” said Reyes.
He was also allowed by the Asia‘s Premiere Basketball League to get great players who are qualified to step on the World stage. But as usual, he has to consult the mother teams of each players.
According to the multi-awarded coach, the PBA (–foul word(s) removed–)ured that if there are other additional players that he would like to join the national team, it will depend on their respective team owners to let go of their player.
Meanwhile, Reyes will be at Barcelona on February 4 to know the details of the competition, where top teams in the World will be competing like the United States and the host country Spain who are going to be anchored by NBA stars. The team brackets will be known this coming February 4 as well as the scheduled venues, located in four different Spanish cities.
Coach Chot Reyes thanks the PBA through his Twitter Post:
Thank you PBA Board for compressing the season to allow us to practice as a complete team by July 15 at d earliest #LabanPilipinas
— Chot Reyes (@coachot) January 30, 2014
