Gin Kings, Bolts begin championship showdown
Credit to Author: Eddie G. Alinea| Date: Mon, 06 Jan 2020 16:16:47 +0000
No team likes to lose. It is in that context that Meralco will face Barangay Ginebra in the best-of-seven PBA Governors’ Cup title showdown starting today.
Coach Norman Black and his Meralco Bolts are seeking a revenge of their twin losses to the Kings in the finals of this same Conference in years 2016 and 2017.
That’s besides preventing another championship shutout for the MVP (Manny V. Pangilinan) Group that, incidentally, started in 2015, the year flagship team Talk ‘Text KaTropa emerged victorious in the Commissioner’s Cup.
Meanwhile, coach Tim Cone and the Gin Kings will be trying to complete another San Miguel Corp.’s domination of the 44th season following the Beermen’s conquest of the Philippine Cup and the Commissioner’s Cup this season.
Both Cone, the most accomplished bench tactician in the league with 21 crowns including a pair of Grand Slams, and Black, 1 of only 4 coaches with a sweep of the season feat, have expressed confidence in accomplishing their mission.
“It’s not gonna be any different,” Cone said during the Finals press conference held on Saturday in Eastwood in Quezon City in reference to his third title match up with his fellow American mentor and the Bolts.
“Bottom line is he (Black) wants to win and I want to win,” Cone said.
Black, who sounded tired of hearing of his team’s back-to-back setbacks against the Gin Kings, agreed, saying, “We’re out to win, just like they are.”
“We realize that we lost to Ginebra twice,” Black said. “We’ve been told of that over and over again and we’re hoping it will be a different result this time around. We want to win the championship,” Black said.
Both the Bolts and the Kings have undergone changes in their lineups in the hope of adding depth to their respective rotations, with Meralco injecting more muscles in their ceiling by acquiring big men Raymond Almazan from Rain or Shine and rookie Bog Quinto from NCAA titlist Letran.
Black has also gotten the services of veteran shooter Allein Maliksi to strengthen his offensive clout. This trio of acquisition has been pronounced healthy and in razor-sharp shape by the coach himself.
Cone, for his part, took in defendable point operator Stanley Pringle from NorthPort and a still unhealthy, but grizzled Jared Dillinger, a former Bolt himself, who is brilliant when uninjured.
“To win a championship, I have been telling the boys, we have to play good basketball. And to play good basketball, we have to always be prepared offensively and defensively,” Black told this writer in a separate interview.
“We are,” he declared rather emphatically. “We’re prepared to be able to attack whatever they’re doing defensively,” he asserted. “And we’re ready, too, to defend for anything they would be attacking us with.”
“We’ll be doing everything there is to do to win — move that basketball and take good shots, help each other in defending the basket. Things we have to do to win,” the Meralco mentor assured.
Cone sort of echoed the same observation. ”It’ll all boil down to playing good basketball. They’ve (Bolts) been the best team in defense this Conference. And the best rebounding team, too.”
Cone thinks the road the Bolts had to come up with to reach the Finals made them a tougher team to engage against in a championship playoff.
“They went against and passed Talk ‘N Text in the semifinals and that, to me, toughened them up more for the next series,” he analyzed. “Playing in Game 5 under that condition and pressure sure made Meralco a better team than the ones we beat three, four years ago.”
“To me, Game 1 and Game 7 are the most important games,” Cone noted. “Win Game 1 and you dictate the series, while the other team, that early would be making adjustments, while you’re building on what you’ve done which is easier aside from getting confidence.”
“We need to worry about Game 1 first before we can say we need to win the championship,” Black, for his part stressed. “It doesn’t work like that. Game 1 is always important in any series. The team that wins Game 1, normally wins the series most of the time.”