The Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas (SBP) has announced Pat Aquino’s replacement as head coach of Gilas Women: BT Toews.
Toews is a Japan-based Canadian coach who is fresh off a highly successful stint with the Fujitsu Red Waves in the Women’s Japan Basketball League. Thrice the Coach of the Year in said league, Toews steered the Red Waves to back-to-back championships in 2024 and 2025 while also making the Finals a grand total of five times in ten seasons. Additionally, Toews steered Fujitsu to the All-Japan Championship—the most prestigious tournament in Japan—also in 2025.
According to the SBP, the highly decorated Toews beat “more than a dozen applicants” for the right to coach Gilas Women, who are currently ranked No. 30 according to the latest FIBA women’s rankings. Prior to his highly successful stint with Fujitsu, Toews also had coaching stints at the University of Winnipeg and Canadian Academy High School in Canada, and at Hyogo, Shibuya, and Toyama in the B.League.
Why Toews’ Signing Could Be a Blueprint
If the hiring of Toews seems out of left field, it’s because it is. Save for Rajko Toroman and Tab Baldwin briefly, full-time head coaching duties in both Gilas Pilipinas and Gilas Women have traditionally gone to Filipino coaches or, in the case of Tim Cone, tacticians who have plied their trade in local basketball for years. That alone makes Toews’ signing a breath of fresh air.
By signing up Toews, the SBP has effectively shown that it is willing to think out of the box and try something entirely different. It signals an opening of the mind and perhaps an acceptance that the best coach for the national team could be an outsider. It might be a bitter pill to swallow, but trying out a foreign coach is a step in the right direction. It could also be the road to take for Gilas Women’s more infamous counterparts, Gilas Pilipinas Men.
Gilas Pilipinas Might Want to Follow Suit
The situation with the men’s team is a bit dynamic, obviously. Gilas Pilipinas has had some levels of success with local coaches like Tim Cone, Chot Reyes, and maybe even Yeng Guiao. And, to be clear, the argument for a local coach is easy to understand—cultural familiarity, emotional investment, an innate grasp of what it means to wear that jersey. All of that is real. Unfortunately, none of it wins games against France or Serbia.
A foreign coach brings something different: distance. No allegiances, no politics, no pressure to play the son of a federation official or the favorite of a major franchise. Just basketball. A foreign coach has seen more systems, faced more elite competition, and—critically—has no stake in the local landscape that so often complicates selection decisions.
To that point, the Philippines has the talent. It has the hunger. What it has lacked, at times, is a clear and ruthless system imposed by someone with nothing to lose and everything to prove. What it has lacked, at times, is the technical superiority forged only by a wealth of experience in different settings. What it has lacked, at times, is a leader with the foresight and know-how to get things done—but without all the extra baggage a local coach usually carries.
Look no further than the Asian Games gold Gilas won in 2023. A foreign reinforcement in Justin Brownlee changed the ceiling for that team. Imagine what a foreign mind on the bench—overseeing training, shaping rotations, building schemes, demanding accountability—could do for the full program.
Local coaches have given Gilas their heart. A foreign coach could give them a blueprint. Sometimes, that’s the difference.
Maybe BT Toews could show us all.
