Gilas Pilipinas locks horns vs Iraq with 2025 FIBA Asia Cup playoff fate at stake

Gilas Pilipinas will put everything on the line as it squares off with Iraq in their do-or-die encounter at the 2025 FIBA Asia Cup on Saturday at the King Abdullah Sports City in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. 

The Filipinos and the Iraqis, both winless with identical 0-2 cards in Group D, will lock horns at 4 p.m. with the winner advancing to the playoffs for quarterfinals and the loser bowing out of contention. 

READ MORE | Can Gilas Pilipinas still advance to the FIBA Asia Cup quarterfinals?

History favors the Philippines, but the national team had only faced Iraq twice in the past in FIBA-sanctioned tournaments. 

During the 2017 Asia Cup in Lebanon, Gilas Pilipinas pulled off an 84-68 win against Iraq that helped the country complete an impressive 3-0 group stage sweep and advance to the quarterfinals against its former rival South Korea. The Filipinos eventually got booted out after absorbing a 118-86 loss to the Koreans. 

Before that, the last time the Philippines faced an Iraq team was during the 1948 Summer Olympics in London. The Philippines likewise defeated Iraq in that clash, eking out a massive 103-30 thrashing for a 3-2 slate in the group stage. 

Since the 2017 duel, the Philippines and Iraq have never met on the court again. But the Filipinos, who rank 34th in global rankings, are under no illusion that Iraq will be a pushover come their knockout game. 

"Well we're disappointed that we didn't get that. That we lost two in a row. We didn't see that, I don't think we all saw that coming and so we're disappointed," Gilas Pilipinas head coach Tim Cone said.

"But the tournament's not over for us. We have a big game against Iraq coming up and see if we can get into the next round."

Gilas is coming off two short comeback attempts against Chinese Taipei and New Zealand with Justin Brownlee carrying the fight in both games. 

Against the Taiwanese, the Filipinos started out flat but got a huge lift from Kevin Quiambao, Scottie Thomspson, and Dwight Ramos in their second half rampage. Their efforts, though, went for naught as they absorbed a 95-87 defeat. 

Gilas had another slow start against the Tall Blacks before unleashing a second half blast. Unfortunately, the fightback wasn't enough anew as New Zealand cruised to a narrow 94-86 victory. 

Cone admitted they will try to address their slow starts and error-plagued campaigns. 

"We're obviously struggling in the first half, we're not playing well in the first half but we're coming back and I thought we played a really good second half but we just couldn't get over the hump," he added.

"Had a couple of turnovers down the stretch that prevented us from really making the game tight. But we just need to keep battling, keep our heads going forward and don't sink because of these last two losses. We can't afford that, there's still more to do and we're going to be ready for our next game."

Iraq, meanwhile, kept it close early against New Zealand last Tuesday before losing steam in the endgame to sustain a 100-78 loss. It then fell to Chinese Taipei with an 87-60 setback, but limited sharpshooter Ying-Chun Chen to a scoreless outing and big man Brandon GIlbeck to just four markers. 

"Hopefully, we can turn that around. We have to and again, it's all going to be about mental, getting loose balls, getting loose rebounds and not allowing the extra possessions to get three-point shots up."

—JKC, GMA Integrated News