By Vivem Soriano
Eagle News Service
Defending Governors’ Cup champions Barangay Ginebra ended sister team San Miguel Beermen’s bid for an elusive Grand Slam with a 104-84 demolition at the Mall of Asia Arena.
Ginebra, who has a twice-to-beat quarterfinal advantage owing to their better record during the elimination round, led by double digits for most of the game, establishing a colossal 29-point lead during the 4th quarter.
The Philippine and Commissioner’s Cup champion San Miguel Beermen simply had no answer against the hot-shooting Ginebra squad that went 14/29 at the 3-point range compared to the Beermen’s 9 out of 20 from downtown.
Import Justin Brownlee led Ginebra’s offensive onslaught with 37 points.
Joe Devance added 17 while twin towers Greg Slaughter and Japeth Aguilar chipped in 13 points apiece.
The dreaded star-studded lineup of San Miguel meanwhile was misfiring all night, except for 3-time reiging MVP Junemar Fajardo, who was his usual dominant self, scoring 19 points, pulling down 22 rebounds and blocking 3 shots; import Terrence Watson who managed 30 points; and Marcio Lassiter, who made 13 points.
Alex Cabagnot was held to 8 points, former MVP Arwind Santos was limited to 6 points while guard Chris Ross only managed 5 points.
It was a disappointing end to the campaign of the Beermen, who were attempting to win this conference’s Governors’ Cup to capture an elusive Grand Slam after winning the first to championships of the season.
SMB should have been either the top or second seed in the playoffs but they lost their last game in the elimination round against Meralco, which sent them all the way down to sixth place in the standings and ultimately drawing and losing against Ginebra in the quarterfinals.
Ginebra meanwhile will advance to the semis and await the winner of the Rain-or-Shine vs TnT series on Friday.
Earlier, RoS defeated TnT, 106-102, to force a do-or-die game.
The PBA also announced that a number of semi-final games will be played out-of-town.
