ANTIPOLO — Arvin Tolentino would rather focus on what’s in front of them instead of looking far ahead even after NorthPort kept its top two hopes alive now that they’re back on track in the PBA Season 49 Commissioner’s Cup.
The Batang Pier on Tuesday night snapped out of a two-game funk following an escape act against a struggling San Miguel to improve to 8-3.
The team remains seated in the second spot of the team standings, just behind TNT (6-2).
Having pulled off the 105-104 squeaker versus the traditional contenders inevitably again sparked talks of the franchise finishing on either one of the top two spots, where teams would earn a win-once quarterfinal incentive.
They’ve been sitting that high in the standings since starting the tourney with five straight wins, leading many to believe that this could potentially become a conference to remember for the crew of Coach Bonnie Tan.
But their main man refuses to set his sights that far.
Instead, all of his attention – for now – is on their January 25 meeting against the injury-riddled Blackwater (3-8) to wrap up their elimination round campaign.
“Mahirap kasi makita ‘yung ano, kasi dikit-dikit eh. Hindi naman kami masyado nagfo-focus sa ganun. We look at the next game lang,” he said during the postgame press conference at the Ynares Center here.
As Tolentino implied, it’s building up to be quite an interesting race to the playoffs, given how the standings appear as of the moment.
A quick look suggests that the top seven teams actually have a chance to finish as the no. 1 seed. Lurking behind the Tropang Giga and NorthPort is Converge at third with an 8-3 record (the FiberXers lost to the Batang Pier earlier).
Then there’s Meralco and Hong Kong Eastern with identical 7-3 cards, followed by the 6-3 Rain or Shine and Barangay Ginebra with a 6-4 slate.
(C) PBA Images
“Looking at the standings, parang isang panalo or isang talo, medyo mataas ‘yung tinatalon mo sa standings eh,” offered the star forward.
“We cannot focus on that yet kasi may isa pa kaming laro, which is ‘yung last game namin sa eliminations. And then after that, siguro, whoever makatapat, we’ll do our best to make it to the next step,” he furthered.
For now, what Tolentino and the Batang Pier would want to do is celebrate the win against the Beermen, which completed their sweep of the SMC teams at this conference after previously beating Magnolia and the Kings.
“It’s a great feeling always sa team, every time you achieve something like what we did tonight,” said the 29-year-old, who fired 22 points and eight rebounds. “It’s a great feeling for us and also for the team, and for the franchise.”
Tolentino was particularly proud of how they all responded to the challenge of Coach Bonnie Tan after being blown out by Meralco and Rain or Shine during that slump, which led to their conquest of SMB to author the historic feat.
“We were talking about starting the game strong since after nung game namin sa Rain or Shine, dalawang game na kaming flat na nag-iistart offense and defense,” he said as they raced to a 36-22 start against San Miguel.
“We started in practice – actually we practiced hard nung isang araw to get guys going. And ‘yun, nag-pay off naman ‘yung ginawa namin.
“Chinallenge kami ni Coach Bonnie. Talagang mainit ‘yung ulo ni Coach Bonnie,” Tolentino added in between chuckles. “But we took it as a challenge, each and everyone of us, especially Kadeem [Jack].”
