Philippines wins finals gold with 'Big Freeze' in 1954 2nd Asian Games

Philippines wins finals gold with 'Big Freeze' in 1954 2nd Asian Games

From Sports Weekly Dated April 9-16, 1976 

The Philippines participated and hosted the 1954 Asian Games held in the capital city of Manila. The country ranked 2nd with 14 gold medals, 14 silver medals and 17 bronze medals. 

14 Basketball players were selected as 5 of them were second asian gametimers (Hechanova, Loyzaga, Mumar, Ramos, and Tolentino ) on Asian Games tournament.

Philippines won over Singapore 82-63, Cambodia 105-41, Korea 84-65 and Japan 68-40, then Korea 76-52 and China 34-27 with an average of 67.75 pts per game and 35.5 lead. 

Rafael 'Paeng' Hechanova, recall an incident during the 1954 Asian Games in Manila when he was skipper of the national team.The championship game between the Philippines and Nationalist China was very close with the Philippines having a rough time protecting a slim margin. During a crucial moment in the last quarter,, Hechanova made a clean block off a Chinese cager who was driving for the basket. The referee whistled a foul and the overflow crowd at the Rizal Memorial Coliseum did not like the call. Suddenly, debris and everything started raining onto the court and during an ensuing riot which halted play, a pop bottle cut a Chinese player in the face.

To avoid further violence, coach Herminio Silva called for a time out and ordered what came to be known as the 'Big Freeze.' The RP cagers in possession of the ball, just stood near the center line and leisurely passed the spheroid among themselves, not moving an inch for the basket. Time ran out and the host team retained the crown it first won three years earlier in New Delhi. Silva's strategy led to the revision of the international rules of basketball. Henceforth, no team was allowed posession of the ball for more than 30 seconds without attempting for the basket. However, Hechanova recalls that there originally was no intention to keep the ball that way. But the Chìnese would not open up their tight zone defense which the Filipinos could not penetrate. So there was a comic stalemate.