Hong Kong Eastern coach says his PBA guest team team isn’t ‘Bay Area 2.0’

MANILA, Philippines — Hong Kong Eastern is expecting a “more competitive” tournament in the PBA Season 49 Commissioner’s Cup, as the guest team started off triumphant in the Philippine league on Wednesday. 

The foreign team blasted the Phoenix Fuel Masters, 102-87, on Wednesday evening. 

The squad had three players left over from the Bay Area Dragons squad that finished runner-up in the PBA Season 47 Commissioner’s Cup – Kobey Lam, Glen Yang and Hayden Blankley.

Blankley was named the player of the game against Phoenix, finishing with 18 points, eight rebounds and five assists on 6-of-8 shooting from the field. 

After Hong Kong’s PBA debut, Blankley said that while there are a few similarities between Bay Area and Eastern, the competition is expected to be tougher this time around. 

“It's a very different team. As you guys know the Bay Area team was blessed with some mainland Chinese players that were all probably 6-foot-6 and above, some 7-footers. This team, not so much,” the 24-year-old gunner told reporters. 

“Whilst we still have a little bit of size advantage at some positions, it's pretty comparable to the Philippines, so now it's a lot more competitive on that end. The Filipino teams can definitely challenge us any night and not have to worry about us being just bigger or anything like that,” he added. 

Bay Area, reinforced by former NBA players Myles Powell and Andrew Nicholson, dominated in their lone PBA season, finishing on top of the eliminations with a 10-2 record. 

The squad, which had numerous players listed at 6-foot-6, including 7-foot-5 big man Liu Chuanxing, also blasted the Rain or Shine Elasto Painters in the quarterfinals and breezed through the San Miguel Beermen in the semifinals to punch their ticket to the Finals. 

They, then, faced Ginebra, which defeated the guest team in seven thrilling games. 

Blankley also underscored that the Bay Area squad that competed in the PBA had more experience playing internationally.

“The experience level too; the Bay Area team had a lot of CBA veterans and I guess you could say that might be considered a higher level. Our team is mainly just Hong Kong locals who are used to playing within the Hong Kong