By REYNALD MAGALLON
Barangay Ginebra didn’t have to think too deeply to identify what went wrong in their 131-121 Game 4 loss to San Miguel.
Kings coach Tim Cone and resident import Justin Brownlee both agreed that their defense simply could not hold up to the offensive juggernaut that the Beermen unleashed.
The multi-titled mentor even came as far as admitting that Ginebra simply had no answers to San Miguel which fed on the inside presence of twin towers of June Mar Fajardo and import EJ Anosike.
Making matters worse for the Kings, as they tried to clog the paint to limit the two, that was when guys like Marcio Lassiter, Terrence Romeo and CJ Perez did most of the damage from the perimeter.
“They were firing on all cylinders. We had no answer for them. They were hitting shots from the outside, they were getting to the rim, getting the ball to June Mar. We just didn’t have an answer for them tonight,” said Cone as the series now went to a virtual best-of-three affair after SMB tied the series anew at 2-2.
To be fair, Ginebra was not entirely lagging behind on the offensive end, especially on a night where Brownlee ended up exploding for 49 points.
But when the resident imports’ offensive might was still not enough to win the games for the Kings, it was saying a lot at how they have defended in the contest
“When I looked at the stats sheet, of course, scoring forty-nine points, I had it going offensively. I think the whole team, we did pretty good offensively. But the story of the game was our defense. We did not perform well on defense,” said Brownlee.
“They’re just too good for us tonight,” echoed Cone.
As deflating as the Game 4 loss, all is not lost for Ginebra heading into Game 5 especially that by going by the trend of the series, the Kings should be able to make adjustments and respond.
Brownlee, though, admitted that he feels things will only get tougher from hereon as he sees the next few games to become tightly contested.
“We definitely don’t expect blowouts in this series. We feel like we’re one of the top teams in this league and we have a lot of respect for San Miguel. We know they’re one of the top teams in this league, if not the top, so we don’t expect blowouts,” said Brownlee.
“But if it’s there, we’re going to take the opportunity when maybe they’re playing bad or I’m sure it’s just the same vice versa. We expect the series to be hard fought the rest of the way,” he added.
