Manila world basketball championship remembered
By Eddie Alinea
PhilBoxing.com
Sat, 18 Sep 2010
Not many, perhaps, still remember that the recently concluded FIBA (International Basketball Federation) World championship won by the U.S.A was once played on these shores. Simply called the World Basketball Championship then, the once every-four-year conclave was held here in 1978 during the tournament?s seventh staging with games played at the historic Rizal Memorial Coliseum in Manila and the posh Araneta Coliseum in Quezon City.
The Philippines? hosting of the world?s biggest and most prestigious basketball tournament marked the first time in the meet?s 28-year history that games were played in two arenas that put premium on the comfort and convenience of the competing teams and the general public alike with the semifinal and final round staged in the air-conditioned Big Dome.
The Rizal hoophouse inside the Rizal Memorial Sports Complex might not have the first class amenities offered by its Quezon City counterpart, but it was a vast improvement from an ancient court encased in a wire cage of the old Luna Park Stadium, site of the tournament?s first staging in Buenos Aires in Argentina in 1950 or the open-air venue in a football field in Santiago, Chile in 1959 and the famous ?frigidaire? court in an old building swept by biting snow-winds from the Pole in Montevideo in Uruguay in 1967.
That the 1978 Philippine championship had, indeed, set the tone of how world sporting conclave should be held was proven in the next editions of the editions from 1982 in Colombia, 1986 in Spain, 1990, again in Argentina, 1994 in Canada, 1998 in Greece, 2002 in Indianapolis in the U.S. 2006 in Hiroshima, Japan and only a week ago, in Istanbul, Turkey.
For two weeks from Oct. 1-14, the entire universe was treated to first class basketball by the 12 competing teams, led by then defending champion Soviet Union and the world-famous friendship and hospitality of the Filipino people.
It was the first time that the championship was held in Asia, where it was originally destined 16 years prior, after it had nurtured to become a really world sporting event in four South American countries ? Argentina (1950), Brazil (1954 and 1563), Chile (1959) and Uruguay (1967) ? one European nation (Yugoslavia in 1970) and a Central American Commonwealth State (Puerto in 1974).
Incidentally, it was in 1954 in Rio de Janeiro in Brazil where the Philippines ended up third behind eventual champion U.S. and host Brazil in what proved to be, up to the present time, the highest finish ever by an Asian country.
Led by Carlos ?The Big Difference? Loyzaga and skipper Lauro ?The Fox? Mumar, the Filipino basketeers hacked out five victories as against two defeats for the unprecedented feat with Loyzaga earning his place in the World Mythical Selection.
The 1978 championship happened to be the second world tilt the country was hosting that month of October counting the World Chess Championship Match between title-defending Anatoly Karpov of the USSR and Swiss challenger Viktor Korchnoi which was then nearing completion in Baguio City.
Karpov, who eventually won the match to retain his title, had even called off one of his game to go down to Manila and root for the Soviet team in its championship duel with Yugoslavia. He was to go back to the Pine City downhearted though after the Soviets lost in a hairline 82-81 count.
The championship could have been the second the country was to host after earning, too, the right 16 years back in 1962, but instead of earning the honor that early shame and embarrassment was what it got instead.
Then President Diosdasdo Macapagal refused to grant visas to players and officials from socialist countries forcing FIBA to withdraw recognition and relegated the meet to mere invitational despite strong appeals from Basketball Association of the Philippines, led by then Sen. Ambrosio Padilla and Asian Basketball Confederation co-founding father Dionisio ?Chito? Calvo.
The Philippines was suspended by FIBA and was reinstated 12 years later in 1974 during the stint of Filipino Gonzalo ?Lito? Puyat II as FIBA president, a position he held for two terms. It was also through Puyat?s efforts that the country earned the right to host the championship for the second time.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Eddie Alinea.
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