Newsmaker: Fil-Am Erik Spoelstra, new Miami Heat Head Coach

37-year old Erik Spoelstra is making history with the Miami Heat. Not only is he the first Filipino to become a head coach of an NBA team, he is also the youngest head coach in NBA history. Soon-to-be Hall of fame coach Pat Riley made this announcement on Monday the 28th of April to the delight of Miami Heat players and fans.

Erik Spoelstra is the son of former NBA executive Jon Spoelstra and Filipina Elisa (not Fe) Celino. He says he is of Dutch-Irish-Filipino descent. He joined the Heat in 1995 after four years of playing for the University of Portland and two years of playing and coaching for a professional team in Germany. He started out with the Miami Heat as a video coordinator. Riley coached the heat that same year and kept Spoelstra in his staff. Since then, Riley has enjoyed working with him. Spoelstra fans are proud of the fact that when the Miami Heat clinched their first championship ring in 2006, Riley’s first celebratory hug was with Spoelstra.

Spoelstra has been assigned various duties including scouting, training and coaching. Riley would occasionally remind Spoelstra to “get ready” because the day might come when he will have to take charge. Well, that day has arrived for “Coach Spo”! 

In an interview last year in Filipinas Magazine, Spoelstra said, “There is one thing that I am definitely interested in doing in the future, and that is helping develop basketball in the Philippines. I have been talking recently with the NBA about me putting together basketball clinics in my mother’s home country, hopefully in one of these next couple of off-seasons. It will be a wonderful chance to see some of my family over there and reconnect with my roots.”

Who knows? With news about Philippine Christian University basketball star Jayson Castro being recruited by the Singapore Slingers to play in Australia’s National Basketball League, perhaps we’re not too far away from sending Filipino players in the NBA.

Oh and by the way, Filipinas will be happy to know that Coach Erik Spoelstra is single. 

Quote of the Day: Hail to De La Salle!

Our quote today comes from St. Jean Baptiste De La Salle, a French educational reformer and priest, who was born on April 30, 1651. He put up schools in France as a way to help the plight of the lower class. He lived with his teachers and they formed the De La Salle Brothers. He trained them so they can provide quality education to the poor children. When De La Salle died, the Brothers numbered over 100 and taught in schools in over 21 French cities.  Today,  De La Salle schools can be found in 80 countries and the Brothers teach with lay colleagues to more than 900,000 students.  

“Hold prayer in high esteem. It is the foundation of all the virtues, and the source of all grace needed to sanctify ourselves and to discharge the duties of our employment.” - St Jean-Baptiste De La Salle

Life is Fun: The World Wide Web Technology Becomes Free for All

Exactly fifteen years ago, the board of directors of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) announced that the World Wide Web (W3) would be free for anyone to use and to develop. And since then “the web” has been the program of choice for the Internet. W3 was invented by Tim Berners-Lee and Robert Cailliau in 1989. They were working at CERN and they wanted a tool to aid physicists communicate and share documents with their colleagues around the world. About three years after they launched the web, CERN saw its potential to go global and they made it “open source”. And so with the help of the Internet (the network of computers that are interconnected), W3 changed the way we share information. 

The Power of the Word

Heaven and earth are full of your glory. - Psalm 148

About this post:

This is the daily post of Lester Galvez Cavestany entitled Perlas. The information here is presented to you in bite-sized servings so that it’s quick and fun to read. It has four parts:  1) Quote of the Day contains history, quotes and biography tidbits; 2) Life is Fun aims to give you a healthy dose of medicinal laughter; 3) Newsmaker is the author’s take on news and views that matter to you; 4) And lucky last, we have The Power of the Word which can serve as your daily spiritual bread.  

If you enjoyed reading this post, come back to this site every day and be sure to share Perlas with your friends. And if you see any Ads by Google that interests you, be sure to click it and let Google connect you to goods and services that you need.

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References:

www.answers.com

Newsmaker:

http://www.miamiherald.com/sports/story/513139.html

http://www.nba.com/coachfile/erik_spoelstra/index.html

http://cache.daylife.com/imageserve/0eeK6jZeavbfN/610x.jpg

http://www.ngetstudio.com/PBL/news/?id=4187

http://www.gmanews.tv/story/26427/Erik-Spoelstra-He-puts-the-Heat-on

Quote of the Day

http://www.lasalle-school.org/newsletterwinter2002.pdf

http://www.lasalle2.org/English/Heritage/History/hehi.php

http://www.giga-usa.com/quotes/authors/st_jean_lasalle_a001.htm

Life is Fun

http://www.cartoonstock.com/blowup_stock.asp?imageref=forn749&artist=Fran&topic=world+wide+web+

http://webservices.web.cern.ch/webservices/Help/?kbid=070002

http://www.ultrashock.com/blog/serverside/info-cern-ch-the-origin-of-the-world-wide-web-134.html

http://info.cern.ch/default.html

http://news.soft32.com/happy-birthday-world-wide-web_2059.html

The Power of the Word:

http://www.nccbuscc.org/nab/readings/043008.shtml

Visit www.filipinovoices.com for more socio-political blogs.

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