Ginebra to move forward after 'perfect storm of negatives' in first loss

After absorbing their first loss in the 2023 PBA Governors' Cup, it is time to move forward for Barangay Ginebra.

The defending champions opened their conference with a 3-0 start before falling to the Magnolia Chicken Timplados Hotshots, 118-88, on Sunday.

"We don't want to use the schedule as an excuse," said head coach Tim Cone, whose Ginebra squad played four games in a span of eight days. "But we do know the value of moving on and moving forward."

"We'll move forward. We have another really tough opponent in San Miguel," said the multi-titled coach as the team faces the Beermen on Friday. "We didn't expect to go undefeated in this conference. We didn't expect to go undefeated in a stretch of four games."

For Cone, what happened in the 30-point blowout loss was a 'perfect storm.'

"It was a perfect storm of negatives for us tonight. I hate to admit this but we were really a tired team tonight, you could see it in our body language. our lack of activity," said Cone.

"We were tired and we played a team that was desperate and had a new life with an import."

Cone added that the tight schedule caught up with Ginebra in what he described as an 'embarrassing night'.

"It just turned into a really embarrassing night. You don't want that on a Manila Clasico night. The schedule just caught up to us," Cone said.

"Before this stretch started, it felt that if we could get to 3-1 or 2-2, I'd be happy, but once we got to 3-0, we were greedy, we wanted to get to 4-0. Not getting to 4-0 with a chance to get the 4-0, now it's just disappointing."

Despite the loss, Cone still saw a lot of positives with the likes of Christian Standhardinger and LA Tenorio playing extended minutes after coming off injuries.

—JMB, GMA Integrated News