EASTERN, a new foreign guest team, showed up against Phoenix last Wednesday night at the PhilSports Arena in Pasig with a different mission—prove it’s not a carbon copy of Bay Area—and succeed where the Dragons failed.
“I saw some comments like we are like Bay Area 2.0. We are not. We are a really pure Hong Kong team with some additional power,” Eastern’s Bosnian coach Mensur Bajramovic said. “This is the first experience for me, and of course, for other players. As we talked before the game, that was my biggest concern. We did not play enough games together.
“In some moments, it was obvious that we missed timing, we missed some situation in defense and everything. But I also want to congrats my players. They were above my expectations,” he added.
Bajramovic spoke after his wards ripped the Fuel Masters 102-87 to launch their bid on a high in the PBA Commissioner’s Cup.
Eastern has four players who have seen action previously in Asia’s pioneering league—import Cameron Clark with NLEX and San Miguel Beer and Hayden Blankley, Glen Yang, and Kobe Lam for a Bay Area side that wound up as bridesmaid to Ginebra in the same edition of the reinforced tilt last year.
“It was an unreal sort of experience now being able to get a second chance with some of my teammates from the Bay Area team that I was really close with,” Blankley said.
Clark showed the way for the visiting squad with 25 points and 11 rebounds while Blankley chipped in 18 markers, eight boards, and five assists.
Yang and Cheung Lung also had 13 and 11 points, respectively for Eastern.
Reinforcement Donovan Smith scored 33 points and grabbed 11 caroms for Phoenix while Jason Perkins and Ricci Rivero combined for 32.
Meanwhile, prized big man Christian Standhardinger is reportedly set to hang up his sneakers despite having a contract with Terrafirma set to expire at the end of the year.
The 6-foot-8 Fil-German suffered a knee injury last September that forced him to miss the Governors’ Cup. He was listed on the injured/reserve list for the mid-season meet.
Standhardinger was the No. 1 pick overall by San Miguel Beer in 2018 before he was traded to NorthPort in 2019 and eventually landed at the Kings.
He won four titles, two with the Beermen in 2019 and two with Ginebra in the 2021 Governors’ Cup and last year’s Commissioner’s Cup.
Standhardinger also bagged the PBA Best Player of the Conference award in the 2019 Governors’ Cup and the 2023 Governors’ Cup.
