ANTIPOLO – Winning just twice in their first five games of PBA Season 50 isn’t an ideal start for Ginebra, but Tim Cone knows that he can’t ask for more.
“I’m not happy with the 2-3 record, but it’s survivable for us,” the league’s most successful coach said on Sunday night at the Ynares Center here.
“I would prefer 3-and-2 or 4-and-1 obviously, but that might’ve been too much to ask against all those teams.”
Cone’s comments came on the heels of their 104-74 beatdown of NLEX to cap off a tiring start to their Season 50 Philippine Cup campaign.
The Kings had to face their fellow SMC teams and all three MVP ball clubs in their first five matches, which, as far as he’s concerned, was the first time that it happened to the crowd darlings.
“When we saw that schedule… That’s never happened before that I can remember, opening the season against those five big teams,” he said.
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Fast forward to now, and they only managed to win two of those outings, with their first coming at the expense of TNT by way of a 92-77 win last Oct. 15.
As much as they would’ve preferred a better record, Cone & Co. have prepared themselves for a rocky start to their conference, given their foes.
“We were prepared mentally that we knew we might struggle early, and that our record may not be what we wanted it to be,” he said.
But now that they have ended that rough stretch by posting their largest win since a 127-93 rout of, coincidentally, NLEX during the Season 48 Governors’ Cup quarterfinals, Cone is hoping that they can finally turn the corner.
The Barangay will now enter the second half of their elimination round, starting against Titan Ultra next Sunday, November 9, in Montalban. They then face Converge on November 14 at the SMART Araneta Coliseum before the FIBA break.
“Tonight we put a good one together. And if we continue to do that, maybe we can go on a little bit of a run, get back into the conference,” he said.
#WATCH: Tim Cone talks about the tough first five assignments of Ginebra 🏀#ReadMore 👉 https://t.co/kbePYI3MTe
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— Tiebreaker Times (@tiebreakertimes) November 2, 2025
