AFTER throwing bricks four days ago in the opener of the Big Dance, buckets came in abundance last night as TNT avoided falling into a big hole against defending champion Ginebra.
Bolstered by a fiery endgame windup, the Tropang Giga humbled the Kings 95-82 in Game 2 of their best-of-7 finals duel for the PBA Governors’ Cup at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
Import Rondae Hollis-Jefferson barely missed a triple double with 23 points, 19 rebounds and nine assists for TNT, while Mikey Williams boomed in five three-pointers and finished with 21 markers, four boards and three dimes.
Roger Pogoy redeemed himself from his shooting woes in the Tropang Giga’s 90-102 loss in Game 1 last Sunday and added 17.
Calvin Oftana also had 14 points and 13 caroms for TNT which tied the race-to-4 series at 1-1 and made it a virtual best-of-5 heading into the third game tomorrow at the same venue.
Tropang Giga coach Jojo Lastimosa said his charges embraced a “must-win” mentality that proved to be among the keys in their triumph.
“They refused to lose tonight, and they knew going into this game that we cannot fall behind 0-2 and they knew that this was a must-win for us. The guys just decided in our practices that we cannot take this lightly and we need to be doing the first punches and not reactive on what they (Kings) do,” Lastimosa said. “Rondae is giving his everything and I know he still has a lot left in his tank.
“This is a long series. Rondae was saying ‘Man, I’m tired’ in practice but this is going to be a long series. Hats off to the guys for committing to the things we did tonight,” he added.
TNT came out like a house on fire and zoomed to a 41-25 spread on a Williams layup at the 6:55 mark of the second quarter.
The Tropang Giga held a 51-39 edge at the half, but Ginebra whittled it to 67-64 going into the final stanza.
A Christian Standhardinger free throw pulled the Kings to within 78-82 but TNT retaliated with a vicious 13-2 blitz behind Pogoy, Williams, and Hollis-Jefferson capped by the latter’s slam dunk that made it 95-80, only 1:12 left.
Standhardinger carried the fight for Ginebra with 29 points and 11 rebounds, while Jamie Malonzo had 17 markers and three boards.
Reigning MVP Scottie Thompson also got 16 and 10 for the Kings, but naturalized Filipino Justin Brownlee was held to just 12 points on 3-of-11 shooting from the field.
