Cone’s faith in Abarrientos pays off

Tim Cone’s faith in RJ Abarrientos paid a handsome reward as he dropped 24 points in their 100-90 win over TNT Tropang 5G in Game 3 of their Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) Philippine Cup best-of-seven semifinal series last Sunday.

The American head coach said he never doubted Abarrientos despite flopping with a sluggish performance in Game 2 last Friday.

But in Game 3, Abarrientos as on fire, exploding for 18 of his 24 points on top of nine rebounds and eight assists to help the Kings post a 2-1 lead in their best-of-seven semifinal series.

“I just believe that he’s just a great shooter, and I know we look at his passing, he’s an absolute fantastic passer, and his ball handling is great,” said Cone, who knows Abarrientos well as his uncle used to be his former player in the great Alaska squad.

“But for me, what makes him special is his ability to shoot the ball and so we’re always trying to encourage him to shoot it. If he’s open, we want him to shoot it and if he’s 1-for-11, we want him to take that next tough shot right after that, because we know it’s going to turn around for him.”

“Anything that’s open for him, he’s going to knock down more times than not, so he needs to stay aggressive for us to win games like this. He’s good off the ball, and he’s good in the single high action, so we were able to give him some single high actions tonight, and they just didn’t have an answer for him tonight.”

Abarrientos’ scoring will be a welcome addition for Ginebra, which already has solid scoring options in Scottie Thompson, Jamie Malonzo, Japeth Aguilar and Stephen Holt.

The 2023 Korean Basketball League Rookie of the Year admitted that it was his teammates who encouraged him to take open shots.

“Everybody has been telling me to take my shots, so it’s up to me how I will read the game,” Abarrientos said.

“My teammates have been telling me ‘just do your thing,’ and I guess I just embraced it.”