IN dire need of a spark, Ginebra coach Tim Cone got what he wanted from a seldom-used guard who was incidentally called up in lieu of the team’s veteran star.
Humbled by San Miguel Beer the last time out, the Kings bludgeoned the NorthPort Batang Pier 131-106 last Wednesday night to get back on their feet in the PBA Philippine Cup.
All thanks to Jayson David.
“Jayson has paid the price. He has done everything that he needed to do. He’s a guy who comes to work really every day. He was like the players were all talking about the pre-season when we came back from the finals,” Cone said of the former San Sebastian College and Lyceum product in the NCAA.
“He was the MVP of the pre-season and we’ve been wanting to find ways to get him into the line-up, but because we have a veteran line-up, it’s hard; we don’t want to remove any of our veterans.”
The afro-haired, 6-foot-2 David wowed the Kings’ legion of fans with 25 points, nine rebounds, three assists, and two steals after he was activated in the roster due to LA Tenorio’s request to be relegated to the unrestricted free agent list to focus on his baptism of fire as coach of the young nationals seeing action in the FIBA U-16 Asia Cup SEABA qualifiers set for May 24-30 in San Fernando, Pampanga.
“When LA had to take a break to focus on his coaching (job) with the junior Gilas, it opened up an avenue for Jayson,” Cone said. “This is something we’ve been wanting to do for quite a while, get Jayson into the line-up. It’s just been a difficult thing with a talented team like Ginebra.”
Ace rookie RJ Abarrientos also shone with a game-high 27 markers on top of eight dimes for Ginebra while Stephen Holt chipped in 15.
Japeth Aguilar, Troy Rosario, and Jamie Malonzo also had 15, 15, and 14 points, respectively, as Cone’s wards atoned for a disappointing 93-104 loss to the Beermen last week and rose to 2-1.
“We did come out with really good focus and that’s something we’re always trying to do. Obviously, we didn’t do that against San Miguel. It’s been a tough conference for us so far, just having less preparation time,” Cone said. “We wanted to give the guys a mental and physical break when they came back from the finals and we wanted to kind of extend that as much as we could without walking in and playing. So, we did two-a-day practices, we did everything to try to get ready. It was kind of like all of them in a hurry-up motion.
“So, it’s been a struggle for us mentally trying to get in. You can see how TNT is also struggling with it. But we snapped out of it a little bit. Got a huge lift from Jayson as well and we came out and did what we were supposed to do. We got sloppy at times, but by and large, we played the game we wanted to play.”
The onus is now on David to prove he’s no one-hit wonder.
“He paid his dues. He played tonight like he plays in practice. It wasn’t anything actually special,” Cone said. “Sorry to say, it wasn’t anything special. He does that in practice every day.”
