BARANGAY Ginebra San Miguel opens defense of the Governors’ Cup on Wednesday against Meralco, a familiar enemy which the Gin Kings have thrice beaten before in the Philippine Basketball Association conferene.
But all those are thrown out the window as the Gin Kings square off with a Bolts crew obviously toughened by those finals setbacks in 2016, 2017 and 2019 in Game 1 of the best-of-seven series set at 6 p.m. at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
But Meralco coach Norman Black appeared wary of two of Ginebra’s primary weapons—defense and Justin Brownlee.
“They are peaking at the right time and their defense is really, really solid,” Black said. “They don’t allow penetration to the lane—a very good rebounding team, and they are shooting the ball really well.”
“And we have to find a way to slow down Justine Brownlee,” Black said.
Talk about defense and Ginebra did a great job against TNT in the quarterfinals, limiting the KaTropa to below 100 points—104-92 and 115-95—and did the same to NLEX in the semifinals—95-86 (Game 1), 104-94 (Game 2) and 112-93 (Game 4). The Gin Kings lost Game 3, 85-86, on an LA Tenorio lapse.
Brownlee? Ginebra’s resident import churned in averages of 30.3 points, 11.2 rebounds and 5.4 assists in 17 games this season, numbers that made him prime for the Best Import award.
His Meralco counterpart Tony Bishop’s been waxing hot, too, with is 25.5 points, 13.4 rebounds, 3.4 assists and 1.5 steals also in 17 games.
Black’s concern is to win Game 1 for a headstart and everything else could follow.
“The team that gets the best start in the series, ends up winning the series,” he said. “It’s not a guarantee, but it is better to get that ‘W’ immediately.”
Ginebra coach Tim Cone admitted he needed to tinker with the team’s defense as the conference progressed.
“I think our defensive matrix was poor through the elimination and we fixed it during the playoffs as we did a lot of different things,” said Cone, whose seeking his 24th PBA-best crown in his 36th Finals appearance. “We started to peak defensively later in the elimination and improved a bit against TNT and NLEX.”
The Gin Kings are playing the Finals undermanned—Stanley Pringle (knee) and Japeth Aguilar (calf), but do-it-all Scottie Thompson has been delivering averages of 13.5 points, 9.6 rebounds and 6.0 assists and big man Christian Standhardinger contributing 14.4 points and 7.8 rebounds.