Japeth Aguilar was a force for Barangay Ginebra San Miguel in their 101-80 rout of the Terrafirma Dyip on Wednesday at the continuation of the 2024–25 PBA Philippine Cup at the Smart Araneta Coliseum. He did it on both ends, too, firing 30 big points, grabbing 7 rebounds, and recording 4 rejections as he stood tall against an overmatched Terrafirma frontcourt.
For the veteran big, his dominant first game in the 2024–25 PBA Philippine Cup was all about grabbing the opportunities coming his way—something his Ginebra teammates can expect as well.
“It’s really up to us to grab the opportunity. It’s still a long way to go, it’s only our first game. But we know it’s really up to us, the team, to really perform,” Aguilar said after Ginebra’s debut win over Terrafirma. “I was just taking every opportunity in Coach Tim’s triangle offense. ‘Yun ‘yung maganda, bibigyan ka talaga ng chance ng triangle.”
Aguilar got his chances all right, and he made the most of them, converting on 12 of his 15 attempts—most of which were open midrange jumpers or lay-up opportunities.
Japeth Aguilar Is Focused on Defense and Building Good Habits
As a long-time pillar of Ginebra, Japeth Aguilar will get his chances—plenty of them. And he’s proven more than capable of delivering the goods most of the time. It doesn’t mean the Gilas mainstay is resting on his laurels. In fact, he is busy working hard on another aspect of his game that Ginebra will need more of: defense.
“Focus lang ako sa laro, focus lang ako sa defense… and then just really working hard on our system,” the Pampanga native added.
The 38-year-old veteran is also working double-time to build good habits as preparation for another potentially deep run in the playoffs should Ginebra play true to form.
“I have to build [good] habits talaga. One time I didn’t sprint back and hindi pwede ‘yun, especially if you want to build habits going towards the playoffs,” Aguilar told reporters.
Japeth Aguilar fired 30 points on a hyper-efficient 12-for-15 shooting night. He also shut down Louie Sangalang and lorded over the paint on both ends.
That’s as good a start for someone looking to build something great.
