MERALCO is not about to take credit away from Barangay Ginebra for winning the PBA Governors Cup championship anew.
Coach Norman Black however, wished the Bolts had a healthy Raymond Almazan the entire best-of-seven finals, if only to give their nemesis a more competitive series.
Almazan sat out Friday night’s Game 5 at the Mall of Asia Arena which the Bolts lost, 105-93, and fell short for the third time of winning a breakthrough championship.
Black said Tim Cone and the Kings deserve being on top anew of the season-ending conference, but believes Meralco could have given them a better fight had the 6-foot-8 Almazan not suffered a meniscal tear on his knee in Game 3.

“Faced a lot of adversity in this series. We lost our big man in the third game, first quarter. And we never seemed to be the same team again,” said Black.
“We went up against a team that’s quite big and quite talented. And without Raymond in the middle, we suffered inside the paint and interior defense.”
With Meralco’s best big man not healthy enough, it was automatic for the Kings to capitalize on the Bolts’ weakness.
“Before Raymond got hurt, the series was tied at 1-1. First quarter (of Game 3) was a close quarter. So we’re very competitive. But once he got hurt, everything seemed to have changed,” said the grand slam mentor.

“I’m not blaming it all on the fact that Raymond wasn’t there, but that was a big factor.”
Black maintained Ginebra deserved the championship.
“A lot of credit should go to Ginebra,” he said.
If there’s any consolation the Bolts had gotten from their third runner-up finish in the last four seasons, it’s that the team was able to finish the season on a high after a rather shaky start into it.
And the addition of Almazan, Allein Maliksi, and John Pinto, along with the return of Best Import Allan Durham had a lot to do with that.
“We came in at 11th place and eighth place before the third conference. So the addition of Raymond and Allein and the return of AD made us a much more competitive team and gave us a chance to win a championship this conference,” said Black.
“I have to be very happy with that. And it shows that we improved our talent and we played a lot better. Talent wins games,” added the Meralco coach.
“We did make it to the championship which means that we started with 12 teams and there were only two left. And we’re one of them,” Black pointed out. “That’s not something that will make you happy, but at the same time, it’s better than coming in third, fourth, fifth or sixth.
“The problem with second place is nobody remembers the second placer. They only remember the first place.”
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