Justin Brownlee hit the game-winner time and again to lift Barangay Ginebra past TNT, 102-100, and take Game 1 of the PBA Season 50 Commissioner’s Cup Finals at a packed SMART Araneta Coliseum on Wednesday night.
The three-time Best Import finished with 23 points, none bigger than the pull-up jumper he hit all over Chris McCullough with only six-tenths of a second left for the marginal bucket as the Kings went to him for the final shot.
The Tropang 5G’s failure to complete the alley-oop inbound play in the last possession of the match ultimately enabled the crowd darlings to escape after squandering a lead as big as 18 points, which they built early in the third.
(C) PBA Images
‘JB’ shot 47.6 percent from the field and also tallied four rebounds and eight assists as his heroics gave the crew the 1-0 lead in the best-of-7 affair, which they could add on to on Game 2 this Friday in the Big Dome as well.
“It was a play we’ve run in the past multiple times for Justin,” head coach Tim Cone said. “That was the same play we ran for ‘The Shot’ back when we beat Meralco in our first championship at Ginebra (back in 2016).”
Coming through in the narrow win as well was RJ Abarrientos with 23 points, including a pair of big four-point shots down the stretch, which shifted the momentum in their favor for good after the Tropang 5G held a 95-90 lead.
And his 27-footers gave them the lead on both instances, the last of which put them ahead at 100-97 with 20.4 seconds remaining before Roger Pogoy tied it up with a trey as the two FEU products figured in a trade of buckets.
“I thought he did a great job of figuring out down the stretch what they were doing, and he responded. And he’s a clutch guy, those two four-pointers were amazing shots,” lauded Cone on the presumptive BPC’s efforts.
Troy Rosario made his presence felt with 16 points and nine rebounds, with Scottie Thompson delivering 15 points, five rebounds, and six assists.
Ralph Cu, Japeth Aguilar, and Jeremiah Gray contributed nicely, also as the troika added at least six points in the victory witnessed by 11,447 fans.
(C) PBA Images
Leading the defending champs, on the other hand, was Chris McCullough with 25 points and 14 rebounds plus four assists as he was key in chipping away at the deficit in the third but was held scoreless come the final period.
Roger Pogoy had 22 points. Rey Nambatac made 19 points as the tandem spearheaded the fourth-quarter assault with long bombs.
Brandon Ganuelas-Rosser and Calvin Oftana made 12 points apiece and combined for 13 rebounds for the Tropang 5G in the rally that fell just short.
Oftana and Jordan Heading tried to connect on an alley-oop set in the final play of the game, but Brownlee was there to deny their attempt as time expired.
The Scores:
Ginebra 102 – Abarrientos 24, Brownlee 23, Rosario 16, Thompson 15, Cu 9, J.Aguilar 7, Gray 6, Torres 2, Holt 0, Pinto 0, Go 0.
TNT 100 – McCullough 25, Pogoy 22, Nambatac 19, Ganuelas-Rosser 12, Oftana 12, Heading 5, Khobuntin 5, Castro 0, Aurin 0, Williams 0, Quitevis 0.
Quarterscores: 30-25, 57-44, 79-72,102-100.
