By REYNALD MAGALLON
The San Miguel Beer bench erupted in celebration as Marcio Lassiter drilled a left wing triple off a nice feed from Jericho Cruz. They were used to seeing the 37-year-old shoot the light out from deep, but that one was extra special.
Lassiter, with that shot at the 6:47 mark of the final frame, has now surpassed the great Allan Caidic at the second spot in the all-time three-point list with the chance of dislodging another PBA great Jimmy Alapag from the top not too far in the horizon.
The SMB sniper hiked his career triples to 1,243 makes – one trey ahead of Caidic’s 1,242 and just seven behind Alapag’s 1,250.
Lassiter, coming into the game, was actually three triples away from tying ‘The Triggerman’ and made sure to surpass him with his four conversions from deep to finish with 17 points.
“Just to be in this elite status is quite amazing. I’m just truly grateful and thankful,” said Lassiter, who apart from achieving the feat on Wednesday, Sept. 11, also helped San Miguel to exact its revenge against NLEX with a 119-114 win at the Ninoy Aquino Stadium.
As impressive as the feat for Lassiter, what’s even more remarkable is just how fast he managed to reach his position on the all-time leaderboard.
According to PBA chief statistician Fidel Mangonon III, Lassiter only needed 536 games to reach his total number of triples – 62 games less of the 598 games Caidic had to achieve his total.
In the top 10, only Lassiter and Caidic had less than 600 games with Alapag needing 601 to achieve his spot at the top which he did back in Oct. 2016.
The number of games could have been even fewer if not for Lassiter needing some time to finally get his shooting touch back after being sick at the start of the season.
“When you lose like 12 pounds, it’s kinda hard to get back to it, regain my strength. I didn’t have the legs, I was really feeling it. I was just tryna not to put too much pressure on myself ’cause I just wasn’t there yet strength-wise,” admitted Lassiter.
But when he got it going, the fateful moment finally came. And he was just honored to be on the same breath with some of the league’s greatest ever to do it.
“I don’t think about it until you guys show it on the big screen in the game, then you can kinda feel it, kinda puts me in perspective in just how truly honored I am,” said Lassiter.
As history beckons, Lassiter is trying his best to not put pressure on himself.
“I just try my best not to think about it every night. It’s a good thing that I’m always constantly just making the extra passes and knowing that the ball will find me, and tonight that’s what happened,” he said.
“It’s just one step at a time. I just try to do what’s needed,” he added.
