 |
| Greatness within reach (Photo credit: mb.com.ph) |
Alex Cabagnot missed having his beautiful nose fixed for this. Marcio Lassiter deferred to everyone else when everyone knew that he is the team’s best shooter. Arwind Santos stopped trying to look like a superstar and just did a lot of the dirty work. Chris Ross just kept providing the Beermen with the “larong mahirap” hustle and energy. Three-time PBA MVP Junemar Fajardo was happy to just put up “pedestrian” numbers instead of Kraken-like ones for the good of the team.
Coach Leo Austria came under fire, for some reason, because he wasn’t using his bench enough—even when they were winning and almost came out of the elimination round unscathed.
Speaking of the bench, they were all just happy to be there and do whatever was asked. No one was going on social media, no young up and comer was posting “play me or trade me” photos on Instagram. They all simply bought into what Coach Leo was preaching.
And it was all worth it.
To get to the PBA Finals, the Beermen had to go through a few old foes: Rain or Shine in the quarters and TNT in the semis.
They didn’t have much trouble with RoS, not with that team being in transition with new head coach Caloy Garcia and missing their “alpha” Paul Lee. The Beermen knew this and pounced accordingly, they rendered RoS’ young star Jericho Cruz useless by having Ross on him early, leaving the veterans trying to out-alpha one another (Jeff Chan and James Yap).
Versus TNT, the first Perpetual Trophy winners and the Beermen’s heated rivals, it was a different story. Somewhere in the middle of that series, it did appear that the Beermen were going to lose it all. TNT just kept finding ways, former PBA MVP Kelly Williams played the best series of his post-health scare life, and Jayson Castro and Ranidel de Ocampo were delivering as always.
But somehow, someway, and with a little bit of luck, the Beermen prevailed.
They forced a Game 7, and to TNT’s dismay Castro suffered an injury that would prevent him from fighting with his brethren. As soon as Castro was taken out of the equation, it just made things easier for the Beermen to advance to the PBA Finals.
Ah, the PBA Finals.
Barangay Ginebra San Miguel, the 7th seed, was there standing in their date with destiny. Everyone knew that Ginebra’s standing was a huge lie. This team just won a championship a few months ago. They have Tim Cone. Whatever short comings Ginebra has, we all kind of went with the notion that “Coach Tim can fix it.”
Only this time, he couldn’t.
The Beermen banded together and rallied behind their five main guys, they offered support, but no one questioned Coach Leo’s stubbornness to not go deeper into his rotation. And well, turns out Coach Leo’s faith was rewarded once again.
The only game the Beermen lost in the series? The one wherein Lassiter was ejected for his salt bae celebration. The one wherein Junemar Fajardo fouled out. The one wherein Arwind Santos took 20+ threes like it was going out of fashion.
And they STILL had a chance to win it in overtime.
This title means a lot if you ask us, because not only does it cement the Beermen’s claim as being the PBA’s standard-bearer, but it also puts Ginebra’s plans for a dynasty, a grand slam even (which we all know will come given the materials at Coach Tim’s disposal), at least on hold for another conference or season.
Today, we can all say that the San Miguel Beermen are the PBA’s best basketball team, bar none.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Thank you for supporting kilikilishot.com all meaningful/ insightful comments are appreciated and published on this page.