By Michael Angelo S. Murillo
Senior Reporter

FINALLY notched a win in their best-of-five Philippine Basketball Association Commissioner’s Cup semifinal series last time around, the defending champions Barangay Ginebra San Miguel Kings look to build on it albeit recognize that it would not be easy once again against a “steady” TNT KaTropa.

Narrowed their series deficit to 2-1 after a dig-deep 80-72 victory in Game Three on Tuesday, the Kings try to take cue from it for Game Four today at 7 p.m. at the Smart Araneta Coliseum to keep their title reign alive and force a decider at the weekend.

Barangay Ginebra had to go through rough seas in the last time game against TNT to stay alive in the midseason PBA tournament as the latter came out with all intents to close out the series.

Import Justin Brownlee making his presence felt on offense in the final quarter and timely baskets from the locals down the stretch made it possible for the Kings to survive and fight another day.

It was an outcome whose significance was not lost to Barangay Ginebra coach Tim Cone, who was visibly relieved to have finally gotten one victory in the series.

“Well, we got one but obviously one is not enough. But the good news is we are still alive. We’ll take it one game at a time. That’s what everybody’s saying but that is really the case. Hopefully we get another one next game,” said Mr. Cone in the post-Game Three press conference.

Mr. Brownlee struggled offensively for much of the game, scoring just six points in the first three quarters.

He then scored eight valuable points for the Kings in the payoff quarter to help his team in its push.

The Barangay Ginebra import finished the game with 14 points, 11 rebounds, eight assists, four steals and two blocks.

Guard LA Tenorio backstopped him with a team-high 16 points while Joe Devance added 13 markers.

For TNT it was import Terrence Jones who showed the way with 24 points and 18 rebounds. He, however, committed eight turnovers in the contest.

Troy Rosario had 12 points while Jayson Castro and Roger Pogoy had 10 points apiece.

Zeroing in on the game today, Mr. Cone said they are expecting another grind of a battle and that they have to be at their best against TNT.

“It was tough getting just one. We just got to see if we can turn around and try to get two,” said Mr. Cone.

“It took everything we had to beat them today. They (TNT) are a team that understands their system and we’re just trying to find some things that would make them uncomfortable and we don’t know if it’s going to work twice. We’ll just have to continue thinking out of the box and try to win. But if we try to allow them to play their game they will just eat us up,” he added.

The winner of this series will face the victor of the semifinal series between the San Miguel Beermen and Rain or Shine Elasto Painters, who were to play Game Three later on Wednesday with the Beermen up in the series, 2-0.

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