TIM Cone believes that they relied too much on their three-point shooting late in the game as Ginebra fizzled out in the endgame to yield to 109-100 loss to Rain or Shine on Thursday in the PBA Commissioner’s Cup semifinals.
Their three-point shooting abandoned them late in the game as the Elasto Painters embarked on a 12-0 blast to complete RoS’ comeback from 14 points down. While Ginebra was missing their shots from rainbow country, the Elasto Painters were hitting theirs as Reggie Johnson and James Yap delivered back-to-back hits to put the game away.
“We just tried to win the game by shooting threes that didn’t go in down the stretch. Theirs did, ours didn’t,” said Cone.
The 20-time PBA champion coach, however, clarified that it wasn’t the sole reason why they lost and credited the Elasto Painters for adjusting well and making the big plays late in the game.
“We got more to give than shooting three-point shots so we weren’t our best tonight. We got to give them credit they hit big shots at big time,” said Cone.
“Some of them made threes that our very, very deep threes. They came out and did what they wanted to do, they played their game so back to the drawing board,” he added.
But Cone isn’t surprised at all with the challenge that Rain or Shine has been putting because after all, they’re the top seed for a reason.
“We knew this isn’t going to be easy, they’re the no. 1 seed and I keep saying that there’s a reason they are the number one seed. We saw it tonight. We just have to take the challenge.”
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