San Miguel gets fully charged

Rest is the biggest advantage San Miguel Beer will have against whichever team gets the chance to challenge the defending champion in the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) Philippine Cup finals.

The Beermen already have a head start of over a week to prepare for the best-of-seven championship series starting 5 June since completing a four-game sweep of Rain or Shine in the semifinals.

In fact, San Miguel even had the luxury of taking a weekend off following its come-from-behind, 107-100, in Game 4 before buckling down back to its daily grind on Monday to prime up for the biggest stage of the all-Filipino conference.

In contrast, the survivor of between Meralco and Barangay Ginebra San Miguel in their best-of-seven semis series that went the full distance will have limited time to lick their wounds and recharge their batteries before taking on a powerhouse squad that has only tasted defeat twice in the season-ending tournament.

The Bolts and the Gin Kings traveled to San Jose, Batangas, for the sudden death Game 7, being played as of press time.

Interestingly, a win by the Ginebra will set up the fourth time the sister teams will battle for the title in an all-local contest.

The Gin Kings dropped all of their four all-Filipino finals head-to-head against the Beermen with their latest back in the 2017 edition when San Miguel wrapped the series in five games.

A Meralco victory, on the other hand, will forge a historic first championship meeting with the Beermen.

Regardless of which team advances, San Miguel head coach Jorge Gallent is confident his men are ready.

“We’re going to our fourth step which is the finals,” he said.

“We just have to think of it one game at a time. We’ll think of how to prepare whoever wins in their series.”

Between the two equally deserving squads only Meralco got to defeat San Miguel in the tournament.

The Bolts denied the Beermen of a rare elimination round sweep after running away with a 95-92 win in Batangas City last 4 May.

San Miguel defeated Ginebra, 95-92, in their elims clash last 4 April.