Cone tips hat to veteran Ross

Barangay Ginebra head coach Tim Cone admired how San Miguel Beer veteran court leader Chris Ross rallied the Beermen from a 0-2 series deficit to force a decider in their Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) Season 50 Governors’ Cup quarterfinals showdown.

The Kings ultimately booked a ticket to the semifinals against defending champion TNT Tropang 5G with a 110-94 come-from-behind Game 5 victory on Tuesday night at the Ynares Center-Antipolo.

However, Cone thought Ross was the engine that helped San Miguel push the best-of-five series the full distance, and his heroics in the only quarterfinals meeting that went to a decider were worth mentioning.

“Well, first of all, just let me say something about San Miguel and especially Chris Ross. You know, June Mar (Fajardo) has gotten his flowers for a number of years with nine MVPs. But I think we tend to disregard Chris Ross’ contribution to that team as a leader,” Cone said after the hard-fought match that saw Ginebra come back from 13 points down in the third period.

The 41-year-old guard and playing assistant coach, who scored 20 points in Game 4 to set up a rubber match, kept the Beermen together throughout the series.

In fact, San Miguel even threatened to complete a series reversal after taking a 76-63 lead with 3:04 left in the third quarter of Game 5.