THREE decades of coaching for Tim Cone meant three decades of watching basketball from the sidelines for his wife, Cristina.
For Cristina, it also meant 30 years of being the wife, best friend, cheerleader, confidante, sounding board, biggest critic, and most essentially, the personal support system of the most successful coach in the history of the PBA.
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Good thing for her, Cristina mostly deals with the laid-back and funny version of the Ginebra coach - far from his intense and focused side on the sidelines.
“He’s an entirely different person at home. He’s not serious at all, and he likes everything light," Cristina shares to SPIN.ph. "He’s a joker, he enjoys laughing, and he likes to tease the kids all the time.”
The Cone household is usually mellow.
After losses or before big games, however, it can get slightly different, but Cristina is already used to handling Tim’s frustrations, rants, and mood swings. It makes it easier that she makes sure to keep track of every single Cone game.
“This is the very reason why I watch the games, if I can’t watch live, I’d make sure to watch on TV or online. I always need to know what happened,” she said.
Cristina Cone's secret
She continued: “The thing about him is he needs to let out everything to feel better… and me, I need to let him know that I get what he’s saying. I say to him, ‘Babes, you’ve been there, done that, it’s not the first time,’ and just right after that, he stops, and his mood gets better. And when he sees that when his venting affects me, he relaxes.”
“And that’s also how we grew our relationship because I was always there, trying.”
More than the 25 PBA championships and Asian Games gold medal among others, Cristina, a managing director of a huge salon chain in the Philippines, likes to celebrate the unique love his husband has for her.
“Tim, he’s very loyal, from the beginning to now, we work our relationship. He’s my best friend," she says, "We just make ourselves involved with each other. I have been watching the games for 30 years now.”
Juggling her day job, mother duties, and WAGs life is not a problem for Cristina, saying basketball has given her family so much.
“We have a lot of blessings from Tim’s career, he’s good at what he does, and for it to be successful, I need to support and love what he does. All-out support is a no-brainer for me,” she says.
Golden moment
Cris also shared the basketball talk doesn’t end on the court for Tim; in fact, it’s how they usually end a long day.
The couple breathes, eats, and sleeps hoops. But among all the moments, Cris bared it was the 19th Asian Games gold medal run that they can’t stop talking about.
“There’s a lot of memories, the championships, the grand slams, and most special one if this [Asiad] gold, when they captured this one, it’s one of those stories we talk about before bed,” she shares. “For him, it’s like a redemption for the country.”
In the 33 years that they've been married, Cris shares the Hangzhou Asiad was one of the few moments she saw Cone absolutely sure and focused.
“He didn’t think about the doubts and the many things going on. When he received a request to, ‘Please take over Gilas’, he was just going day by day, and I was just praying a lot. He’s fixated to that goal, and having seen him move past it, it’s amazing.”
It’s not just his battle, but hers, too.
Cristina Cone a champ in her own right
And in the 40 years that they've been together, 30 of those spent on basketball, Cristina has mastered the task of ‘making things easier, when the stress gets harder' for the most decorated tactician in the land.
As Mrs. Cone, she's no doubt a grand slam champion.
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