PBA: Northport relishes ‘luxury’ of having well-balanced crew

Northport Batang Pier coach Bonnie Tan in the PBA Philippine Cup. –PBA IMAGES

MANILA, Philippines—Northport flaunted a well-balanced team en route to a win over Phoenix.

In a thrilling win that hiked the Batang Pier’s record to 2-1 in the PBA Philippine Cup, seven players scored in double digits in the 124-120 win–much to the delight of coach Bonnie Tan.

“We have the luxury of players who can score, deliver and can finish. I’m just happy that we’re getting what we need to capitalize on, in terms of scoring distribution,” said Tan at Araneta Coliseum on Friday.

SCHEDULE: 2024 PBA Philippine Cup

“Hopefully, other players can step up; players who haven’t performed well who we all know can deliver in the scoring department.”

Cade Flores, who got snubbed for the Rookies-Sophomores-Juniors game for the All-Star weekend, proved his mettle by top scoring for Northport with a double-double of 21 points and 12 rebounds.

Zav Lucero, who’s coming off a scoreless outing in Batang Pier’s 112-104 win over Converge on Sunday, bounced back in a huge way with 18 points for the victory.

READ: PBA: Arvin Tolentino thriving as NorthPort ‘leader’

Jeff Chan and Joshua Munzon scored 17 a piece while, surprisingly, Arvin Tolentino had the lowest double-digit outing with 15 points.

With the squad’s balanced effort, Flores said that should the trend continue for Northport then big things await the squad that got bounced off last conference’s quarterfinals at the hands of Ginebra.

“They were damn near triple-teaming or quadruple-teaming Arvin but if we can trust each other the way we did in this game or in the future, I think we’ll be pretty hard to beat,” said the Arellano product.

“We have a lot of scorers like Jeff, Josh, even Zavier who just came in, can score. If we can work together and get that chemistry, we’ll be a good team, for sure,” he added.

Coincidentally, it’s the Gin Kings who will next face the Batang Pier on Sunday at the same venue.