San Miguel Beer coach Leo Austria is hoping that the two-day rest will benefit his team after absorbing a 109-96 loss to TNT KaTropa in Sunday’s opener of the PBA Commissioner’s Cup Finals.
The Beermen were forced to make a quick turnaround after surviving a hard-fought semifinal series against the Rain or Shine Elasto Painters that ended last Friday, and Austria conceded that the short respite played a big part in the Game 1 setback.
“It’s hard to play the first game, especially if you don’t have time to prepare. And we’re surprised with what happened,” Austria said after the 109-96 defeat at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
“Physically and mentally, we’re not there because we’re not able to recover from the exhaustion from our series in the semifinals. Hopefully, this coming Wednesday we could make the necessary adjustments,” added Austria.
Import Chris McCullough and June Mar Fajardo accounted for 56 of the team’s scoring output as main locals like Chris Ross, Arwind Santos and Alex Cabagnot struggled.
Ross scored seven points but had six rebounds, seven assists and four steals but Cabagnot was 1-of-5 for two points and Arwind Santos went 2-of-7 to finish with five points.
Terrence Romeo and Christian Standhardinger were the other SMB players in double figures with 11 and 10 points.
On the other side, TNT felt like it was in control at the start with import Terrence Jones dictating the offense and the rest of the team frustrating SMB on defense.
In fact, nine of SMB’s 18 turnovers came from McCullough, including one when TNT’s Roger Pogoy easily stole the ball before flashing his tongue as if he had stolen a candy from the former NBA player.
“We couldn’t even put up a gameplan, honestly. It was such a quick turnaround,” Ross said. “I was hoping that Game 1 was on Wednesday so we can have all the presscon and all that stuff, at least give us a couple of days to kinda prepare.
“But it’s the nature of the business. And now, we got two days now, sit back and watch film and we see if we can come up with a gameplan,” he added.
Santos, however, refused to make the fatigue factor an excuse.
“Kung titignan, hindi rin yun (fatigue factor). Ang tingin ko paano kami gagawa ng paraan para masolusyunan yung depensa nila. Yun lang talaga yung depensa,” said Santos.