Ginebra withstands Meralco, goes up 1-0 in PBA Finals

By: Leobert Julian A. de la Peña

The Barangay Ginebra San Miguel showed veteran poise down the stretch as they took down the Meralco Bolts, 91-87, in Game 1 of the PBA Governor’s Cup Finals.

Justin Brownlee came up big once again for Ginebra, torching the Bolts to the tune of 38 huge points and 16 big rebounds.

The veteran Ginebra squad survived a furious shooting display by the Bolts during the third period that gave them a decent cushion of 10 points.

It was Brownlee who provided the sparked for his team by going on a run of his own, shooting tough fade-aways and going to the hole against the dominant paint defense of Raymond Almazan and Allen Durham.

It was up to the locals to do their share and they did it in timely fashion after taking over in the clutch led by crafty point guard LA Tenorio, who embraced his matchup with a young and upcoming Baser Amer of the Bolts.

Tenorio scored numerous times in isolation situations that left Amer struggling to keep up with “The Gineral’s” pace of attack.

Chris Newsome carried the Bolts in the last two minutes of the ball game by scoring 8 straight points but was not enough to take down the mighty GSM team.

The Bolts are looking to even up the series on Friday, January 10, 2020.