Boss Danding.

Those two words best described in a nutshell businessman-sportsman Eduardo “Danding” Cojuangco Jr., who passed away after battling lingering illness on Wednesday. He was 85.

“He (Cojuangco) intensely wanted the Philippines to regain basketball supremacy in Asia even before the Open era,” noted Samahang Basketball ng Pilipinas executive director and former PBA commissioner Sonny Barrios.

“We lost a basketball icon in Boss Danding.”

Indeed, the man endearingly called Boss Danding was the man in charge of revitalizing the country’s once proud men’s basketball program after it took a nosedive when the country’s top amateur players left en masse for the fledgling pro league, the Philippine Basketball Association, in 1975.

The dire consequences of that development was felt almost immediately when the national team lost its grip of the Southeast Asian Games men’s basketball crown to host Malaysia in the 1981 edition held in Kuala Lumpur.

Enter Cojuangco, an avid basketball fan, who was tapped by late President Ferdinand Marcos in 1980 to become the project director, or “godfather,” for basketball in cooperation with the Basketball Association of the Philippines, the forerunner of the SBP, the sport’s national governing body.

Armed with deep pockets, the businessman found a willing and able accomplice to his grand master plan of reviving men’s basketball in the country in American coach Ron Jacobs, who was lured out of his job as head coach of Loyola Marymount to oversee the rebuilding of the national team.

“Boss Danding was a visionary and a great loss to Philippine basketball,” said commissioner Ramon Fernandez of the Philippine Sports Commission, a four-time PBA MVP, who played out his final years with the San Miguel franchise until 1992.

Basketball innovator

Without dipping into the PBA pool of players, Cojuangco’s dream was building a squad of outstanding talent, subsidizing and priming them over the long haul, and making them battle-ready for international competition under the tutelage of Jacobs.

Known as someone who thought out-of-the-box, he was the pioneer in bolstering the national squad with overseas players who could work within the system of Jacobs, an innovator himself.

The seeds of their highly successful partnership begun to bear fruit in 1981 when the Philippine quintet, under the colors of the Cojuangco-owned Northern Cement, made its debut in the William Jones Cup held in Taiwan (now known as Chinese-Taipei).

The Northern Cement squad beat a team featuring US NCAA Division I players, with former Purdue coach Gene Keady calling the shots, en route to ruling the single-round tournament.

In the same year, Jacobs piloted an an all-Filipino crew in winning the Asian Youth Basketball Championships, capped by a 74-63 conquest of China in the finals held at the packed Araneta Coliseum.

That team was led by Hector Calma, Teddy Alfarero, Alfie Almario, Elmer Reyes plus Tonichi Yturri and Jun Tan, standouts from De La Salle University, Cojuangco’s alma mater.

But the program suffered a setback in 1983 during the Asian Basketball Confederation men’s basketball championships, as the FIBA Asia Cup was then known, held in Hong Kong.

Peppered with naturalized players, the national team forfeited its preliminary games for fielding an extra player during a game, bowing out of title contention and eventually winding up ninth in the 12-team tournament.

The Cojuangco-Jacobs collaboration reached its apex in 1985, rebounding from its previous debacle after the Philippine 5 regained the ABC men’s championship, toppling defending champion China 82-72 in the finals held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

EDSA 1986 cut short basketball progress

With swingman Jeff Moore and center Dennis Still serving as the backbone plus US-based Filipino Ricardo Brown and local stars Hector Calma and Avelino “Samboy” Lim holding their own, the Philippines went on an unbeaten 6-0 run, sealing a ticket to the world championships hosted by Spain in 1986.

But the team disbanded due to the 1986 People Power Revolution that ousted Marcos from the presidency.

Among those who felt the sorely loss of Cojuangco was Brown, who paid the sports patron a glowing tribute on his FB page, accompanied by a picture of him and Cojuangco during the 1981 Jones Cup.

“Painful as hell to write this. I got the news about 4 p.m. when I was getting ready to run the lake as I do every day,” Brown, now a high school principal in the US, wrote.

“It has taken me hours to write this because I am somewhat stunned at the realization that this man (Cojuangco) who is more than special to me is no longer with us.”

Dubbed The Quick Brown Fox,” Brown recalled that “The Boss” left a profound impression when he asked permission from Cojuangco to leave the national team to turn pro for Great Taste.

“The PBA opportunity was now a reality, but it all depended on the Boss (Cojuangco). I would have done whatever he wanted me to do,” Brown recalled of that meeting where Cojuangco gave his blessings.

“If you asked me to give you three descriptive words that would express my feelings for the Boss, they would be Respect, Admiration, and Loyalty,” he added of his experience with the former San Miguel honcho.

“May you now Rest in Peace, Boss Danding. God Bless you, Sir.”

Another basketball luminary who acknowledged Cojuangco’s generous heart was Meralco coach Norman Black, who began his coaching career in the PBA for the San Miguel Beermen.

”He (Cojuangco) gave my first opportunity as a player coach for San Miguel in 1985,” he said.

“At that time, he (Cojuangco) saw something in me that I didn’t see in myself,” added Black, who steered the club to its first PBA grand slam in 1989.

A green-blooded La Sallian, Cojuangco was a prominent booster of the school’s sports programs, particularly basketball, supporting it from 2012 to 2019, which produced two UAAP men’s basketball championships.

In one of his last school contributions in 2016, the businessman, who was difficult to say no to, was able to convince coach Aldin Ayo to handle the Green Archers soon after the mentor piloted the Letran Knights to the NCAA men’s basketball title the year before.

Ayo steered the Green Archers to their ninth UAAP basketball crown, archrival the Ateneo Blue Eagles in the best-of-3 playoffs of Season 79.

(For more sports coverage, visit the ABS-CBN Sports website).