Almost a week into his new role as head coach of Rain or Shine, Chris Gavina says instilling the "outwork everyone else" attitude among his players is top priority for the 2021 PBA season.
And he feels good about the current crop of players the team has, noting that veterans Beau Belga, Gabe Norwood and James Yap, along with young turks Javee Mocon and Rey Nambatac are setting the tone in the offseason.
"Our vets starting with the triumvirate of Belga, Norwood, and Yap have come into our group training sessions with a great sense of urgency and purpose behind their individual physical conditioning in preparation for our upcoming season," Gavina told ESPN5 over the weekend.
"I think my role as the newly-appointed head coach of ROS is making sure the proper attitude is set for the culture we want to these veteran and young players to embrace," he added.
"We want our attitude to embolden our players to play the game the right way, being selfless, being mindful of each other's success, being accountable for their starring in each of their roles, and most importantly being a great teammate."
Rain or Shine reached the semis three times in the last six conferences under Caloy Garcia's watch. But with management looking for new direction, the team's big bosses felt it's time to make a change, moving Garcia to an active consultant role and concurrently head of basketball operations.
Gavina wants to build a new team culture by developing mental fortitude on players as they possibly play in a PBA bubble again.
"I've tried to explain to them and the rest of our players that we need to get prepared for another possible grueling bubble set up. If that does occur, not only do our players have to possess a peak level physical condition but also develop the mental fortitude to be able to be mentally strong enough to adapt and overcome any adversity thrown our way," explained the 42-year-old PBA coach.
"Our younger players starting with Javee Mocon and Rey Nambatac have set the tone early that they are ready to take a step up and emerge as the tandem we need to lead our group not only statistically but also be our emotional leaders on and off the floor," shared Gavina, who joined the ROS franchise in 2018 as one of Garcia's assistants.
Gavina noted that Barangay Ginebra's recent acquisition of Christian Standhardinger in a trade that sent Greg Slaughter to NorthPort only makes the Kings a "nightmarish" foe moving forward.
"A headache would be an understatement for Ginebra after this acquisition of C-Stand. They are more like a 'nightmare' that you hope you can wake up from," noted Gavina.
Standhardinger, a noted inside banger and workhorse, will be pairing with athletic big man Japeth Aguilar.
"If there's a movie analogy I can compare to it would be 'the perfect storm' and you hope you can survive its onslaught," the ROS coach emphasized.
Other than Ginebra, Gavina said they also have to contend with San Miguel Beer and Magnolia, which recently boosted its frontcourt by adding Calvin Abueva in a trade.
"The mindset we will need to be able to compete against those perennial title contenders is we have to be willing to 'outwork' them even before we play them," said Gavina.
"The preparation needed to beat those elite teams starts now, being able to accept that the only way to overcome their wealth of talent is to match it with our brand of hustle and playing with pace and togetherness on both ends of the floor."
The last time Rain or Shine won a PBA championship was in the 2016 Commissioner's Cup when Yeng Guiao was still head coach.