The question of the history of basketball in the Philippines popped up because my third novel (the literary mystery), mentions three young men playing basketball in the plaza. The novel is set in 1909 in my mythical place, Ubec, Philippines. My husband did not think basketball would have reached the Philippines as of yet. He said basketball first started in 1891, in Springfield Massachusetts.
I was sure I had researched this but I checked again.
I quote Wikipedia: "Basketall, which was invented at a YMCA in Springfield, Massachusetts, was introduced to the Philippines by the YMCA early in the American colonial period (1898-1946). The Philippines succeeded to win several medals in various pan-Asian competitions over the next few decades."
Basketball was and is very popular in the Philippines, and everywhere you go, you'll find young men shooting hoops. Even after the super typhoon Haiyan, men were playing basketball at refugee camps.
I quote from the Philippines Hoops Blog:
"One thing typically unites a nation. For some, it’s culture. For others, religion. For others, sports. For the Philippines, it’s basketball – a sport that transcends age, gender, social class and generations.
"Basketball is to Filipinos what football is to Brazilians. Basketball is the national pastime. Visit the Philippines and you will find that basketball is everywhere – played anytime, anywhere, with anybody and in any form. From the courts in schools and residential estates, to public courts and hoops found on every street corner, you’ll hear the familiar thud of a dribbling ball or the clang when it hits the hoop. Athletes love the game; they play basketball to socialize. If they are not playing, they are either watching a professional basketball game from the U.S. on TV with family, or they’re with friends, and even strangers, talking about it. Either way, it is a not a sport that can be ignored.
...
"The American colonial government first introduced basketball in the Philippines in 1910, making it part of the physical education curriculum in schools. It was originally intended as an activity for girls, as baseball and track and field were deemed too rough and intense. The nation is one of the world’s first nations to play basketball, and the sport debuted in the country only 19 years after it was invented in 1891. Besides the United States, it’s hard to find another country that has played the sport as seriously and for as long as the Philippines. It’s also home to the second oldest basketball associations in the world, as well as Asia’s first professional basketball league."
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Now, I will admit that the information above states that basketball was introduced in 1910, and my novel is set in 1909, but I'm citing Poetic License to explain the one-year difference.
The top picture shows my son playing basketball with some children. This was in Palawan in 2013 while waiting for a ferry at the pier.
I'd also like to mention Rafe Bartholomew's book, Pacific Rims, which is about Filipino passion for basketball. Here's a review posted in Amazon, and that's a picture of Rafe which I grabbed from his Twitter account:
"Rafe Bartholomew traveled to the Philippines to better understand a country that loved basketball as much as he did. What's resulted is a book as varied and unique as the hoops tradition he found there, a dizzying mish-mash of social history, personal narrative, and rock-solid sports journalism. As raw with emotion as it is informative, Pacific Rims can make you both laugh out loud and tear up-sometimes in the span of a single sentence."
-by Bethlehem Shoals, author, FreeDarko Presents: The Macrophenomenal Pro Basketball Almanac
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Tags: basketball, Philippines, Filipino, sports, Rafe Bartholomew
This is all for now,
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