Only seven players played for Ginebra, but they got the job done.
Barangay Ginebra San Miguel coach Tim Cone rode his horses on Wednesday against the Terrafirma Dyip. The PBA’s winningest tactician fielded in just his core seven players as Ginebra outlasted the Dyip to clinch a twice-to-beat advantage in the PBA Governors’ Cup quarterfinals.
Cone’s short rotation against the Dyip was a stark contrast to the previous two games, when he routinely gave minutes to Von Pessumal and even seldom-used backups Sidney Onwubere and Jared Dillinger. Then again, Ginebra won both of those games—against the Phoenix Super LPG Fuel Masters and the Converge FiberXers—going away.
This time, Ginebra was dragged into a battle of wills, and Cone was not about to play around.
“I didn’t want to lose the game,” was Cone’s reasoning.
“We made a decision that we were going to go for this win. This was crucial for us to get to that top four,” Cone elaborated. “We didn’t want to leave it playing Talk 'n Text [TNT Tropang Giga] later on, so we weren’t gonna gamble with anybody or with anything. We’re just gonna go with our core and let them play and win the game.”
But, on hindsight, Cone said he should have trusted his bench more.
“It [short rotation] kind of backfired on us ‘cause our guys played a little tired,” Cone admitted. “I was kicking myself throughout the game, saying ‘I should have played the bench more, I should have played more guys’ ‘cause we were playing tired.”
Still, as the saying goes, old habits die hard.
“That’s just my style. I kinda circle the wagons when we have a real big important game that I think is going to get us over the hump,” said Cone. “Then we circle the wagons and make sure we get the guys out there that we want to play.”
Those wagons— Justin Brownlee, Christian Standhardinger, Scottie Thompson, Jamie Malonzo, Nards Pinto, Jeremiah Gray, and Stanley Pringle—got the job done and Wednesday, and now Ginebra is assured of a twice-to-beat advantage for the first round of the playoffs.