To many, this is the veritable title playoff before the true titular series.
On one side is the Philippine Cup titlist with its Magnificent Six of Charles Rhodes, June Mar Fajardo, Alex Cabagnot, Chris Ross, Marcio Lassiter and Arwind Santos.
On the other side is Star with its exciting guard rotation and hulk of an import Ricardo Ratliffe – the hottest team in the league at the moment on a seven-game romp.
The Beermen and the Hotshots start what could well be a slam-bang best-of-five semifinal series in the PBA Commissioner’s Cup at 7 p.m. Saturday at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
“Clash of the Titans. I feel like whoever’s gonna win this series is gonna win the title so it’s gonna be a real intense series,” said Rhodes.
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Ratliffe sees a series going the full distance and a stretch-out battle boiling all the way down to the final play.
“Five games,” he said. “I’m pretty sure if you ask anybody in our locker room, they’ll say we’ll win. And if you ask anybody in their locker room, they’ll say they’ll gonna win."
Both are driven strongly by a lofty aspiration.
The Beermen are in hot pursuit of championship that will keep them in the hunt for a grand slam. The Hotshots, on the other hand, ache to end a seven-conference title drought.
The two teams, along with Barangay Ginebra, finished with identical 9-2 win-loss slates in the eliminations. San Miguel, however, beat Star in their elims matchup.
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“We beat them in our previous match, but we’ll now have to deal with a bull-strong import in Ratliffe,” said SMB coach Leo Austria.
The Hotshots have a perfect 5-of-5 record with Ratliffe, the leading contender for the Best Player of the Conference award with his monstrous double-double stats.
But Ratliffe himself will now be facing a tough challenge versus Fajardo and old-time rival Rhodes.
“San Miguel will be a lot tougher because of their experience, the frontcourt combination of June Mar Fajardo, Charles Rhodes and Arwind Santos plus their magnificent guards. We have to have a good defensive scheme,” said Star coach Chito Victolero.
“But I think we’ll have a good matchup with Ricardo’s presence at the paint,” Victolero added.
Ratliffe and Rhodes have known each other well from the Korean league battles.
“Rhodes is a good player. Sometimes, he beat me, but we won the championship,” said Ratliffe.
“It’s always a big match-up when we play. It’s always a big game even in Korea, it’s one of the sellout games cause we’re the two best tall imports. We’ve been out there for a long time, it’s always a big match-up against him,” said Rhodes.
The backcourt matchups are as exciting.
Austria has had great successes with the combination of Cabagnot, Ross and Lassiter. Star, meanwhile, has reemerged as a title contender with a new backcourt lineup composed of Paul Lee, Jio Jalalon, Mark Barroca, Justin Melton and PJ Simon.
