PBA Finals: Justin Brownlee remains upbeat with long series ahead

Justin Brownlee. PBA PICTURES

MANILA, Philippines-Losing Barangay Ginebra of the Bay Area in Game 4 of the PBA Commissioner’s Cup championship series must have left a bad taste in the mouth of the Gin Kings’ resident import.

But Brownlee has plenty of reasons not to rush. American forwards, after all, know that this streak is long.

“For sure,” he said of the dampener that 94-96 loss on Saturday night. “It’s great that Scottie (Thompson) and I, you know, got the award and then won the game.”

“But sometimes, it doesn’t work that way,” he said.

The loss weighed doubly heavily on Brownlee on the night, as he was crowned the tournament’s best import at the time. Also, a triple-double of 23 points, 13 rebounds, and 11 assists was nothing.

“You just have to give Bay Area a lot of credit. They came out, took threes, and hit threes. They did a good job on the defensive end,” he said.

“And that’s what the playoffs are like [are],” he added. “Every game is going to be tough and they come out and play hard.”

Brownlee also refused to accept that Dragons import Andrew Nicholson’s absence surprised the crew.

“We have been in this situation, I would say, some of the time I was here,” said battling the enemy without import.

“I think it’s been handled well because we’ve been here before, I don’t mind. I just think the problem is that Bay Area just really came to play, they were very focused. They played with great energy on both sides. And, you know , just have to give them our cover.

It is worth noting that the third time Brownlee was crowned Best Import, Ginebra continued to win them all.

But he felt that trivia was nothing more than that: trivia.

“We knew the series wasn’t over, we didn’t lose in the Finals, it was just one game,” Brownlee said.

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