The way the Meralco Bolts zoomed to a 1-0 lead in their best-of-seven PBA Finals series with a 104-91 rout on April 6, 2022 showed how Ginebra was in big trouble in defending their Governors’ Cup title.
Don’t let the margin fool you. Although the Bolts were up by a manageable 11 points at the half and the Kings cut it to just five with a Justin Brownlee three-pointer, 65-60, at the 5:11 mark of the third, Tony Bishop caught fire to steer the Bolts in pulling away for good. Ginebra struggled to keep abreast with the Bolts since then.
Bishop scattered 10 points, including two triples, to lead a 13-0 run close out of the quarter.
A 7-5 exchange during the first 3-and-a-half minutes increased the lead to 85-65 and practically ended the game except for the shouting.
The runs took the fight out of the Kings and the Bolts look like they can turn the series where they are supposedly the underdogs into a blowout in their favor.
Until Arvin Tolentino came along in the dying seconds of the game.
Challenged but not to be pushed around
Tolentino was on mop up duty in the dying seconds of Game One and was applying pressure to Raymar Jose when the latter dribbles and backs up, creating contact which the referee aptly called a foul. Surprisingly, it was Jose who seemingly resent the foul he initiated by going to the face of Tolentino.
The play was simple: With Meralco already assured of the win, Tolentino was covering his guy, was bumped and was suddenly being showed up.
Unusual, it was the winning team “trash-talking” the losing team in just the first game.
Tolentino was not having any of it, mightily responding to the challenge to a point it even reached the locker rooms.
Lighting a fire for Ginebra
On top of how to stop Bishop and their injury concerns, Ginebra is in quandary how to solve Meralco this conference, given they have done the trick against higher seeds Talk and Text and NLEX.
Dropping into a 0-2 hole to the Bolts might be something they could not recover from.
Tolentino might have lit a fire as the Kings stopped this from happening.
Glaring difference
Aside from Cone begging the referees to act on the elbows his team was taking, it was Tolentino who held up his ground against the “physical taunts” from the Bolts.
His resistance got into his teammates heads and got carried over to game two as the Kings were clearly different personas in the games.
They were letting the hits pass by and turning to the referees to stop the “bullying” in game one. While they were cool on the physical plays but the were also as cold in their games.
They were the exact opposite in game two, pretty expressive in holding their ground. Thompson declared they were ready to engage in the physical game if needed. Nards Pinto was getting to the face of Cliff Hodge. Christian Standhardinger, who was the recipient of some nasty elbows and hits, was not to be pushed around no more, Brownlee was the Justin we saw in game four of the semis against NLEX where he was the object of physical plays. L.A. Tenorio run into Cliff Hodge for a chance at a loose ball.
The starters’ output team-wise, got up a notch as well. Look at how Ginebra’s leading the game dramatically swung to their favor while they were on the floor:
Game One: Thompson -17 (team-worst), Brownlee -15, Jeff Chan -15, Tenorio -12.
Game Two: Thompson +7, Brownlee +7, Jeff Chan -1, Tenorio 0.
Tolentino may have zero minutes in game two but he should be named Best Player of the game. The way he set the tone for game two and its subsequent effect are clearly invaluable for the Kings moving forward.
Coach Tim Cone mentioned in past interviews this conference that he was in search for the fifth guy in his starting rotation, particularly a small forward.
Here’s his chance to see if Tolentino is the long-term answer to his quest. If I were him, I would play Tolentino heavy minutes the rest of the way. I suspect a Tolentino breakout series in the offing.
He made what could have been a lopsided series into a humdinger.
By Armando M. Bolislis
