BARANGAY Ginebra was playing well for at least three quarters against Meralco, until the roof cave in.
In an unexpected turn of events, the Bolts gave the Kings a doue of their own medicine after coming back from the depths of a 16-point deficit to hack out an 89-75 comeback on Friday night in the PBA Philippine Cup at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
Coach Tim Cone lamented how his team failed to complete the job and fell apart at the height of a searing Meralco rally near the end of the third quarter onwards.
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“We played a great game for about 32 minutes and then everything fell apart,” said the Ginebra coach, pondering on what hit his team during the game.
“I think we’re up by 16 and then they made a run and made it a five-point deficit at the end of the third quarter. I thought we played like I said, that tremendous 32 minutes in this basketball game. We just couldn’t sustain and finish it.”
Ginebra fell to a 1-2 record leading to its game against defending champion San Miguel in Dubai next week.
Still Cone wasn’t hard on the Kings despite the meltdown.
“We didn’t play well in the first game, but we played well the last two games. I thought we played well tonight. We just couldn’t keep our momentum going,” he said.
The Kings erected a 54-38 lead on a three-pointer by former Meralco big guy Norbert Torres with 5:46 to go in the third period.
But with the Ginebra reserves Sonny Estil, Nards Pinto, RJ Abarrientos, and Torres inside, the Bolts made their way back to the game and went on an 18-7 run to finish the third and trail by just five heading to the final 12 minutes.
“It started with our bench, they couldn’t hold our lead. And when our first group came out, they couldn’t restore the momentum. They got overplayed and they got tired,” said Cone.
Meralco then went for the kill in the final seven minutes as Chris Newsome’s corner three put the team in the driver’s seat after a long chase, 67-66.
The Kings regained the upperhand on two free throws by Stephen Holt, before the Bolts countered with a decisive 16-1 run that took the fight out of Ginebra, 83-69, with 1:32 remaining.
“There were reasons why we got that lead, and we just lost our discipline in the end,” said Cone. “So we didn’t really play good complimentary basketball tonight in terms of getting the proper playing time coming from that tough win against TNT.”
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