Barangay Ginebra returned to the Finals through a familiar come-from-behind fashion.

Christian Standhardinger scored on a short stab off a feed from Justin Brownlee with four seconds left as the Kings completed a comeback from 18 points down to sweep the San Miguel Beermen with a nail-biting 87-85 Game 3 win in the 2023 PBA Governors’ Cup semifinals at the Smart Araneta Coliseum on Wednesday, March 29.

Christian Standhardinger delivers big anew as Barangay Ginebra finishes off San Miguel. (PBA Images)

The defending champions of the season-ending conference showed their poise as a 12-3 finishing kick in the final frame made up for their error-prone game that saw them commit 24 turnovers while also shooting just 52 percent from the foul line.

“It’s certainly different from the first two games, isn't it? It was a real struggle out there from a coaching standpoint,” said head coach Tim Cone who admitted that he was already pondering the possibility of pulling the plug off their fight and trying to close it out on the next game day.

But his players, in a true never-say-die fashion, refused to go down until a window of opportunity opened for them in the waning minutes of the final frame – a chance which the Kings made sure to hold on and not let go.

Back-to-back hits from Standhardinger before Jeremiah Gray nailed a booming triple off the right wing put Ginebra ahead for the first time since the first quarter and triggered the massive run.

Brownlee then put on the finishing touches as he scored on a jumper before breaking down the SMB defense to set up Standhardinger on the weak side, breaking an 85-all deadlock.

“I was just wondering do I pull my guys out and live to fight another day on Friday or do we keep going at it and that was my battle throughout the whole third and fourth quarter but they just kept showing a will. I was looking for them to kinda give up a little bit but they never did that so I stayed with them,” said Cone.

Brownlee led the way with 22 points and 14 rebounds while the Best Player of the Conference frontrunner in Standhardinger scattered 14 points, 17 rebounds and seven assists. Scottie Thompson also added 17 points and 11 rebounds as the Kings secured a fifth finals appearance in the last seven editions of the Governors’ Cup.

Cameron Clark paced the Beermen with 16 points and 10 rebounds while CJ Perez added 14. Marcio Lassiter chipped in 13 points on two triples – the first of which gave the Beermen an 18-point lead in the first half, 62-44, while allowing to surpass former SMB sniper Dondon Hontiveros at the sixth spot of the all-time three-point list.

His second triple also came at a right time as it tied the game for one last time at 85-all before Standhardinger dashed all of SMB's hopes of extending the series.