With his career-high 51 points, NorthPort's Arvin Tolentino joined an elite list of local PBA players.
Arvin Tolentino assumed a different form of bucket-getter August 29 for NorthPort.
In the Batang Pier’s dominant win over Converge in the PBA Season 49 Governors’ Cup, Tolentino fired an incredible 51 points, putting him in rarefied air among PBA locals.
Arvin shot 15/27 from the field for 51 points, making 5/10 three-pointers and 16/16 free throws.
[Related: PBA: Arvin Tolentino drops career-high 51 points as NorthPort scores back-to-back wins after routing Converge in Governors' Cup]
His 16 made free throws without a miss tied a 35-year-old PBA local record, or since Alvin Patrimonio also went 16/16 in 1989, per chief statistician Fidel Mangonoon III.
More importantly, Tolentino’s 50-piece has him joining an elite list of PBA local players.
While 50-balls can be quite common for PBA imports, the league just saw two this week before Tolentino, it’s quite the achievement for locals.
Before Arvin Tolentino lit it up for NorthPort, another Batang Pier ironically was the last local to also hit 50 in the PBA.
[Related: PBA: NorthPort star Arvin Tolentino downplays 51-point night, attributes it to luck]
Back in 2018 against Columbian, Stanley Pringle fired his PBA career-high 50 points for the then Globalport Batang Pier in the Commissioner’s Cup.
Before the two Batang Piers, the PBA has to go back 20 years to find the last local 50-ball, with the honor belonging to Asi Taulava.
Playing for Talk ’N Text, Asi fired 51 points in a win over Purefoods in the Fiesta Conference, a mark that stood as the highest for a local in the 2000s until Tolentino matched the output.
In terms of home-grown local players, the last ones to hit 50 were Allan Caidic and Rudy Distrito. In the fateful Tivoli-Ginebra game in 1991, Caidic fired his PBA local record of 79 points, while Distrito scored a phenomenal 54.
Oddly enough, Tolentino made no four-point shots in his 51-point game. With the PBA’s new, but still rather controversial rule, can Arvin or another PBA local come back and serve up another 50-piece?