BY REYNALD MAGALLON
After two finals matchup and a game into their third meeting, it seems like Barangay Ginebra head coach Tim Cone had seen enough.
Fed up after being on the wrong end of another titanic collision with TNT in the Finals, the veteran coach has challenged his team to try and change the narrative of their rivalry heading into the Game 2 of their PBA Season 49 Commissioner’s Cup Finals, Sunday, March 16 at the Mall of Asia Arena.
While there’s no need to press the panic button just yet after a 95-89 defeat in Game 1, Cone said the Kings need to exert more effort to turn the tables against a potent Tropang Giga team.
“We have to understand that this is going to be a much tougher series than it was the last one,” said Cone as the burden of adjustment now falls on Ginebra just like when it lost its series opener in its 2-4 Finals series defeat to TNT in the Governors’ Cup.
“It’s Game One. It’s not what we wanted. We’ll deal with it and we’ll move forward (but) I’m kind of getting tired of saying, ‘We’re outplayed, we’re outcoached.’ I got tired of saying that, so we got to change the narrative,” he stressed.
The Kings hardly looked like the same squad that manhandled topseed NorthPort Batang Pier in the semifinals, falling behind by twin-digits early and struggled to put on the clamps on the Tropang Giga’s scorers.
Rondae Hollis-Jefferson fired 34 points, 13 rebounds and eight assists while RR Pogoy had 15 all of which came from three-point connections.
In contrast, Justin Brownlee had 28 points although he was made to bleed for every bit of it just to keep the Kings within striking distance.
“We got a little bit confused out there because of their defense, they defended really well as usual,” said Cone.
“We have to step up our defense as well. We made way too many defensive mistakes,” he added.
