No eighth-seeded team in PBA history has ever won a championship, and TNT has an opportunity to become the first to do so should it pull off a successful title defense in the upcoming Season 50 Commissioner’s Cup Finals.
Head coach Chot Reyes did admit that it would be an honor for the Tropang 5G to accomplish as much, but their focus, really, is not on chasing any kind of history whatsoever–a ‘back-to-back’ bid isn’t even in their minds either.
“Those are nice things to hear. But in the end, it doesn’t really matter much,” he said during the pre-Finals presser at the Novotel Manila Araneta City, Monday.
“For us, what matters is really how we prepare, how we play against a very high-quality team. ‘Yun lang iniisip namin eh. For us, it’s just noise. Hindi namin iniisip na ‘yung mga ganyan.”
The flagship MVP franchise forged a rematch with Barangay Ginebra in the Last Dance, and going all the way to this stage should be an achievement per se, already for a crew that struggled early in the midseason joust.
(C) PBA Images
Given their caliber as a unit, almost nobody expected TNT to finish as the no. 8 seed by elimination rounds’ end, which put them in a precarious spot come the quarterfinals as they got paired up with the twice-to-beat NLEX.
But their pedigree came into play, flipping the switch all of a sudden to beat the Road Warriors twice. That seemingly got them going as the Tropa went on to finish off another sister team in Meralco in the semis in six games.
And by going through that wringer, they’d become just the second eight-seeded team to reach the Finals in 14 years, or since the Powerade of Gary David made a spirited run toward the Philippine Cup Finals back in 2012.
The Tigers took out the top-seeded B-Meg of James Yap in the quarters, and then ousted Yeng Guiao and Rain or Shine in the Final Four.
That team, though, which also had JVee Casio and a young Marcio Lassiter, couldn’t win it all as they lost to, coincidentally, Reyes and TNT in five.
Now, it’s interestingly the Tropa could finish what their old foes fell short at. But then again, all of their attention is on the King and Kings alone.
“First of all, we have a different team because of the import [situation] that we have,” he said as they lost Bol Bol and brought in Chris McCullough. “The key, I think, is our ability to continuously adjust and adapt to Ginebra’s game.
“And for me personally, my only objective is to be able to play at a high level. Because that’s the only way we can compete. If we play our best, we give ourselves a chance. But if we do not play our best, we have no chance,” the 61-year-old mentor furthered.
“Even if we play our best, it’s still a 50-50, but at least we have a chance.”
