Aside from finishing with 21 points on 7-for-9 shooting in Barangay Ginebra’s 103-90 win over Meralco Wednesday night, Greg Slaughter was also instrumental in limiting Bolts import Arinze Onuaku.
Slaughter was praised by mentor Tim Cone in the win that pushed Ginebra to 7-4 in the team standings, as he played topnotch defense against Onuaku.
Onuaku was held to only 10 points–his lowest output in the PBA Commissioner’s Cup–on 4-for-8 field goals.
Slaughter gave credit to the rest of his teammates for being able to hold down such imposing presence, and added if Ginebra is to return to the semifinals, they have to exert great effort on the defensive end.
“My teammates really helped me out on the defensive end,” the big man said.
“I am more happy with how we are playing now heading to the play-offs. We have a good defensive effort. We have to focus on getting better.”
“Great defensive job all-game long. It started from Greg. He put up great numbers but he followed our schemes and focused really well. That was a telling part for us to win this game,” Ginebra head coach Tim Cone said of the team’s game plan to contain Onuaku.
Ginebra last made the semifinals during the 2013-14 Philippine Cup, Slaughter’s maiden conference in the PBA. Since then, it has been a struggle for Ginebra, but they now have a big chance of making the last four again.
“We are making progress and we have more room to improve. We just come off two big wins. It’s just all execution and being patient. We are really sharing the ball. Most importantly, it starts with defense,” Slaughter added.
To make that a reality, Slaughter says the team has to continue playing hard on defense. Ginebra is the league’s top defensive team in the conference, allowing only 97.1 points per 100 possessions. The team also leads in rebounding with 51.1/game.
“My first conference, I got a taste of the semi-finals. Here we are. We can’t assume we are already in there (semifinals). It’s a best of three series, we have to take it one game at a time and keep playing every game really hard on defense like what we did,” he said.
