Ginebra, NLEX turn back rivals

BOCAUE, BULACAN —Flexing his biceps after overpowering two defenders for a short stab and drawing a foul to boot, Greg Slaughter completed a three-point play to cap a dominating performance inside that practically announced how ready Barangay Ginebra is to challenge the PBA Philippine Cup kingpin of the last three seasons.

Despite having to deal with a constant double- or even triple-team defenses, Slaughter finished with 24 points, 12 rebounds and four blocks and led the Gin Kings to a pretty impressive handling of Magnolia, 89-78, Monday night at Philippine Arena here.

More than winning their debut against one of the teams listed as a favorite here, the Kings showed that they have the manpower to challenge powerhouse San Miguel Beer and end the Beermen’s stranglehold of what has been the most important tournament of the season.

“This is really his conference and he is the only match [one-on-one] for June Mar (Fajardo, the San Miguel cornerstone and reigning four-time MVP),” Ginebra coach Tim Cone said in praise of his 7-foot center. “And don’t forget that two years ago, he was leading this conference in scoring and rebounding before he decided to have surgery.”

There were three others who tossed in twin digits for the Kings, with LA Tenorio coming up with another splendid quarterbacking effort with 15 points and the last of his six assists going to Japeth Aguilar for a two-handed alley-oop slam that was wildly appreciated by the crowd of more than 22,500.

Aguilar, Cone’s athletic 6-foot-9 power forward, scored 12 like Jervy Cruz, who came off the bench.

The loss was the first in two games for the Hotshots, whose top gunner, Paul Lee, was shackled all night long by the unforgiving Ginebra defense.

“I thought we played Paul Lee very, very well. He is so scary, he is so talented and I have a lot of respect for that guy,” Cone said as Lee finished with just 16 points after tossing in 30 against Alaska last Wednesday.

“We prepared really hard for him [defensively],” Cone said.

Meanwhile, with another impressive collection of all-around numbers, Kiefer Ravena keyed a 115-104 NLEX victory over shorthanded GlobalPort in the curtain raiser.

Capping a 20-point night with a breakaway slam, Ravena also finished with five rebounds, four steals and a couple of assists while going error-free in almost 30 minutes as the Road Warriors won a second straight game while slowly coming to terms as to who their franchise player will be.

It was a much better game that NLEX played, compared to its shaky win in its season debut a couple of nights back against lightly regarded KIA Picanto.

And it was also helped by the fact that the Batang Pier, again under the guidance of Pido Jarencio, played without top gun and national team standout Terrence Romeo.

NLEX coach Yeng Guiao readily admitted as much.

“We were lucky that Terrence did not play,” Guiao said in Filipino. “Against only Stanley (Pringle), he was more than a handful. What more had Terrence played?”

Guiao, though, stressed the importance of getting the right chemistry to avoid something like what happened against the Picanto.

“We just gave ourselves a nice Christmas Day gift [and] we have a two-week break, but we will keep practicing through the rest of the holidays,” he said.