MANILA, Philippines — Ginebra coach Tim Cone was relieved with the thought that the Gin Kings managed to escape the upset axe of the Blackwater Bossing last Friday.
Well, who wouldn’t, considering that the Bossing was just days apart from achieving a king-sized 126-120 victory against the mighty San Miguel Beermen.
And standing at the forefront of that giant upset was heavyweight import Robert Upshaw.
In fact, Upshaw, who weighs over 250 pounds, threw his massive weight against Ginebra’s front court led by Japeth Aguilar and Troy Rosario.
Upshaw ended scoring a huge 43 points, along with 17 rebounds against Ginebra.
The Gin Kings managed to use their experience in the end to deny the Bossing of a win via their 115-108 to secure their fourth straight win, and improve to 6-2.
“The big guy came out and hit two four pointers right in the beginning of the game. We knew Mr. Upshaw can shoot from the 4, we saw that against San Miguel and the previous games,” said Cone, whose team trailed big, 23-3 early in the opening quarter.
Fortunately, Ginebra got its bearing in the next three quarters en route to mounting the big comeback.
“Mrx Upshaw, he’s a man, He’s a very large human being, he knows how to use his body, and he moves well, he’s awesome,” added the concurrent Gilas Pilipinas head coach.
“We just had a hardtime handling Mr. Upshaw. When we watched him on tape against San Miguel, we’re commenting that June Mar looks like a big boy next to him,” he added.
“And we looked like little boys next to June Mar. Some of us looked like babies to Mr Upshaw.” Ginebra tries to build on that experience as the team faces Titan Ultra on Sunday.
