Defense eats Offense (A tale of the Manila Clasico)

Yesterday night, It was “Manila Clasico” inside the Smart Araneta Dome. Many fans came to watch this exciting and crucial game for both Barangay Ginebra Kings and the Bmeg Llamados. 

So it starts smoothly for the both team, they have good defense and a good rebound. But the odds favored on the Bmeg Llamados, Their great defense turned into good offense in the middle of the 1st quarter and continued in the 2nd quarter. The kings manage to strike back some points to cut the lead and tie the game in the 3rd Quarter, but their effort wasn’t enough to withstand the storm brought to them by the Bmeg and lose with a 70-82 score

It was Marc Pingris who was featured to be the player of the game because of his aggressiveness and good defense that led him to a good offense.

But the main story here is about Mark “The Spark” Caguioa who only manages to get 3 points this game because of his 3/4 FT’s. This night is not the night for Caguioa for he shot 0/9 from the FG lane and 0/3 in the 3pt lane. Many said that Caguioa was able to get that kind of stat during their game yesterday because of the defense of the Bmeg Llamados Particularly on him. It was not easy for Mark Caguioa for he holds a big responsibility to the team being it’s top scorer. Coach Tim Cone gives Him Credit for that and thus told his players to Strictly defend him on this game. Mark wasn’t able to bring spark to the team because all of the attention is focused on him, he was not given a easy shot by the Llamados because they know that when he started to score, all the Ginebra players will be “Sparked” because of him. and that’s why Tim Cone puts a big responsibility to his player PJ “The Scoring Apostle” Simon to Strictly Guard Mark Caguioa. PJ simon did not let Coach Tim Cone Down and he defended Mark Caguioa very well or in the tagalog term “inasawa na niya”. anyway because of the defense of PJ simon, Mark Caguioa was forced to pass the ball to his teammates or take a hard shot. But even though Caguioa is not scoring for Ginebra, Bozeman, Raymundo and Helterbrand steps up for the Barangay Ginebra kings. But the effort of the three guys can’t match the Team Effort of the Bmeg Llamados Especially to their defense. Marc Pingris, Marquis Blakely, Yancy de Ocampo and Rafi Reavis became the Bmeg’s answer to win this game for their defensive effort that leads to a Good Offensive flow. In the end Bmeg won against the Barangay Ginebra Kings and now Ginebra will face a do or die game versus the Talk N’ Text Tropang texters this upcoming wednesday.

In Basketball, Defense play a major role, Because without it there is no offense, look at how Bmeg outdefended Ginebra, They have more offensive and defensive rebounds and blocks too. And as you can see Their Great Defense resulted them in victory in this “Manila Clasico” Series.