BY REYNALD MAGALLON
It was no secret that three-point shooting has been one of the potent weapons of any Yeng Guiao team and it was only natural for the veteran mentor to push his players to develop one.
That was the case for rookie Adrian Nocum who’s emerging as one of Rain or Shine’s leading scorers so far this season.
While the rookie out of Mapua University had proven his ability to penetrate and get to the basket, Guiao said Nocum would become a more complete offensive player should he develop his outside sniping.
“Adrian has been playing good games the past few games pero nag iiba talaga laro niya if he’s making his three point shots,” Guiao pointed out as Nocum came a point shy of resetting his career-high after finishing with 28 points built on five triples.
“Today he made enough three point shots to be able to also balance his offense, the drives and the layups,” he added as his rookie also added seven rebounds and six assists to complete his all-around showing.
Nocum shot 5-of-9 from the three-point territory – a huge improvement to his 1-of-11 clip through the first four games of the Elasto Painters in the conference.
The 24-year-old guard said he’s been sharpening his accuracy from deep to continue thriving offensively especially when opposing teams start to figure out how to defend him.
“Lagi naman sinasbi sakin ni coach na kailangan ko praktisin yung tira ko sa labas kasi mahihirapan ako kung puro drive lang,” said Nocum.
“Binibigyan naman nila ako ng kumpyansa basta pag open itira ko pag nag close out idrive ko,” he added.
Now that he has already shown that he has the capability to nail the long bombs, the next challenge is do it on a consistent basis to become a legitimate threat.
“Problema ko lang talaga sa sarili ko is yung consistency. Kailangan consistent ako every game and yung tira sa labas na basta pag open igrab ko yung opportunity na iyon,” he added.
