Gilas Pilipinas Women hope to prove their mettle with Asia’s best at the 2025 FIBA Women’s Asia Cup.
For eight years now, Gilas Pilipinas Women have been able to keep themselves afloat in Division A of the FIBA Women’s Asia Cup. This time though, they’re aiming for more than just being able to stay at the highest level of competition in the region.
That is, Gilas Women have the perfect chance to propel themselves into a maiden appearance at the FIBA Women’s World Cup in 2026 by finishing in the top-6 of the FIBA Women's Asia Cup, where only eight teams are participating.
But for head coach Pat Aquino, the upcoming schedule is more than just aiming for the bare minimum or a World Cup berth.
Grouped with powerhouses Japan and Australia in the Women’s Asia Cup, the Filipina cagers are out to prove that they belong in Asia’s biggest stage.
“Of course, you have to aim high every time,” said Aquino during the FIBA Women’s Asia Cup trophy tour press conference earlier this week.
“You know, I’ve been mentioning having to really work hard and represent our country well. Being here for almost eight years, I think the experiences that we had together and the new ones coming in, especially that the new ones are familiar already because they are coming from the youth program, so that’s a good motivation for us that you know, everyone is into what we want to do — our goals and our objectives,” he added.
Thanks to the hard work of the Gilas Women program in recent years, the national women's team — across the board, from the youth teams to the seniors — are now all in Division A of the Asia Cup.
Lining themselves up with the best of the best in the region, the FIBA Women’s Asia Cup presents the perfect opportunity to prove their place among the more developed programs.
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Now, Aquino hopes that Gilas Women can take it to the next level.
“So we hope that you know, we can be at that level. We want to show everybody that we can compete and perform well.” he said.
There won’t be any problems in motivating the players, though, as Aquino knows that they’re more than eager to do their part in making sure that the Philippines continues its upward trend — and hopefully bring the community a big win in the form of a World Cup appearance.
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“The girls are very excited, very eager. We’re preparing well and hopefully those hard work that they’ve been doing can produce wins for us,” he said.
Before heading to Shenzhen, China for the Women’s Asia Cup on July 13 to 20, the Gilas Pilipinas Women will compete in the William Jones Cup in Taiwan also in July.