By Leobert Julian A. de la Peña
The Barangay Ginebra San Miguel handed the NorthPort Batang Pier a harsh reality check after crushing them, 131-106, in the ongoing PBA Season 49 Philippine Cup on April 30, 2025, at the Philsports Arena.
With the much-needed win, the Gin Kings avoided a second straight defeat in their pet conference and bounced back from a disappointing loss against the San Miguel Beermen during their last outing.
Stealing the show for Ginebra was Jayson David, a former Lyceum standout who was activated in the lineup to fill the shoes of LA Tenorio.
Tenorio, who is still juggling his duties as a PBA pro player and the chief tactician of the Gilas boys’ youth team, didn’t play for the Gin Kings that paved the way for David’s insertion.
Upon getting his jersey called to step inside the hardwood, David didn’t disappoint and paid off the trust of the Ginebra coaching staff.
The versatile combo guard was everywhere on the court hitting shots, while at the same time disrupting the Batang Pier’s offensive sets with his pesky defensive reads in the passing lane.
From a narrow six-point advantage, David’s personal scoring run and back-to-back steals midway through the third all of a sudden ballooned Ginebra’s cushion to 18 points, forcing NorthPort to call another emergency timeout.
Despite minor defensive adjustments deployed by the Batang Pier including a soft 2-3 zone, David continued his majestic outing and let it fly from the parking lot. His efficient three-point shooting was also Ginebra’s zone-buster counter, a move that they didn’t give up until NorthPort decided to switch to a man-to-man defensive scheme.
David continued to wreak havoc in the final frame after hitting the NorthPort defenders with several jab jumpers while detonating his last trey before getting subbed out.
Patience finally paid off for David as his chance to receive more minutes from head coach Tim Cone became a breakout performance, delivering 25 points and nine rebounds to Ginebra.
The daredevil guard only missed a single shot out of nine attempts from the field, while capping off the dub with a perfect 4/4 shooting from the rainbow country.
“He played today like he plays in practice. It wasn’t actually anything special, sorry to say, it wasn’t anything special because he does that in practice every day,” said Cone after David’s stellar outing.
Top-scoring for the Gin Kings is RJ Abarrientos who tallied 27 silent points, backstopped by Stephen Holt and Japeth Aguilar who had 17 and 15 markers, respectively.
Ginebra will look to build another winning streak on May 7, 2025, as they take on the revamped NLEX Road Warriors in the last game of the scheduled doubleheader.
