Ginebra head coach Tim Cone praised Japeth Aguilar for soldiering on despite losing “a couple of teeth” during their eventual loss to NLEX on Sunday.
The veteran forward headed straight to the dugout during the third quarter but came back just before the period ended.
He made it a point to suit up for the Kings, although his efforts were not enough as they fell short in overtime.
“He lost a couple of teeth. [But] That’s another thing that I’m really proud of him coming back and playing,” the champion mentor told reporters moments after their narrow 103-99 defeat at the SMART Araneta Coliseum.
Aguilar left for the Ginebra locker room at the 6:59-mark of the third, shortly after he asked for a timeout. He was visibly hurt from an inadvertent hit from opposing forward Tony Semerad when he tried to contest the latter’s lay-up.
Still, he managed to return to the match, and went on to finish with 22 points on 7-of-8 shooting from the floor and nine rebounds.
Unfortunately, the Kings couldn’t complete the comeback from seven down late in regulation. They lost Justin Brownlee to cramps during OT, eventually yielding to the close loss in a tough end to their PBA Governors’ Cup group phase run.
However, just the fact that he returned and played despite getting his teeth knocked out was enough to make the PBA’s winningest coach proud.
“He could’ve sat out and not come back, but he wanted to come back and play in the fourth quarter and in overtime. Gotta give him a lot of props for that because it’s not an easy thing to come back from,” Cone said.
The 66-year-old felt relieved as well that the injury his big man suffered is quickly repairable. Aguilar is set to see the dentist on Monday.
“Hopefully, he should be OK,” said Cone.
“Luckily it was teeth and not a broken nose or a jaw or something like that. Just something that the dentist can repair.”
Ginebra is bound for the quarterfinals as the third seed of Group B, and will take on the no. 2 team of Group A in Meralco in a best-of-five affair.
