Mikey Williams has made the Converge FiberXers’ gamble look like a stroke of genius.
The 35-year-old Fil-Am guard was named PBA Player of the Week by the PBA Press Corps for the period of November 3–10 after providing the clutch shooting that lifted the FiberXers into the semifinals of the PBA Governors’ Cup for the first time in franchise history.
Mikey Williams Beats Out Standout Guards
Williams edged teammate Juan Gomez de Liaño and Barangay Ginebra San Miguel’s Scottie Thompson for the citation. Thompson was the hero of Ginebra’s 110-94 Game 5 win over the San Miguel Beermen that sealed the crowd darlings’ own semifinal berth.
In Converge’s two crucial wins of the week, Williams averaged 11.0 points, 4.0 rebounds, and 2.0 assists, shooting 33 percent from the three- and four-point arcs. The numbers don’t capture the impact. He saved his best for the biggest moment.
The Back-to-Back Triples That Sealed It
The FiberXers closed out the Rain or Shine Elasto Painters, 120-109, in Game 4 of their best-of-five quarterfinals on Friday at the Smart Araneta Coliseum to win the series, 3-1. The Elasto Painters had cut the lead to 109-107 with 3:23 left when Mikey Williams answered with consecutive three-pointers to restore an eight-point lead at 115-107 with 2:42 to go. That 11-2 run buried Rain or Shine’s hopes of forcing a deciding Game 5.
Williams finished with 17 points on 6-for-15 shooting, including four triples, to go with 7 rebounds and 3 assists. Import Cameron Clark carried much of the load with 32 points, 12 rebounds, 6 assists, and 4 steals, and Justin Arana and Alec Stockton added 16 and 14.
“I just stay ready,” Williams said afterward. He credited coach Delta Pineda for pushing him to keep shooting and said he knew some of those shots would eventually fall.
A Gamble That Paid Off
The moment was a long time coming for Converge. The franchise took heavy criticism for acquiring Mikey Williams’ signing rights from the TNT Tropang 5G in a trade last year, and his performance helped justify the risk and the one-year wait. A two-time champion with TNT, he was also Finals MVP of the 2023 Governors’ Cup, and this series brought back shades of those glory days.
“Mikey’s experience is a huge factor, especially in the quarterfinals and in this coming semifinals,” Pineda said.
What’s Next for Converge
The FiberXers will take a break to recover and recharge before facing the NLEX Road Warriors in the best-of-five semifinals, which begin on December 4. Pineda is not shy about calling his team the underdog. He said NLEX is still the No. 1 team and that Converge is the underdog.
For a franchise that had never made it this far, being the underdog is a nice problem to have. And it has a veteran sniper in Mikey Williams who knows how to deliver when it counts.
