By REYNALD MAGALLON
The 2024 PBA Philippine Cup Finals now boils down to a best-of-five affair and both San Miguel and Meralco are scrambling to seize the advantage in Game 3 on Sunday, June 9 at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
Splitting the first two games of the series, the Bolts and the Beermen are expecting nothing but a dogfight in the crucial contest that tips-off at 6:30 p.m. before an anticipated good-sized crowd following a pair of surprisingly close affairs to start the series.
Throwing haymakers at each other one after another in the waning seconds of Game 2, SMB’s bid of reestablishing its dynasty was endangered to falling into a 0-2 hole if not for the late game heroics of CJ Perez and Marcio Lassiter.
Perez and Lassiter nailed a pair of cold-blooded triples inside the final 22 seconds just exactly when Meralco looked to be on its way to a commanding 2-0 series lead.
While the Beermen escaped by the skin of their teeth with 95-94 Game 2 win to tie the series at 1-1, it was undeniable that SMB was far from its dominant form against Meralco’s top defense.
The Bolts, for almost the entirety of the first two games of the series, had the Beermen on the rear – something that SMB head coach Jorge Gallent wants to change coming into the crucial turn in Game 3.
“Meralco is a tough team, they grind hard and their energy is really high. It’s just the energy we just have to match their energy,” said Gallent, whose SMB finally beat Meralco in this conference for the first time.
“You can see naman eh when our energy goes down, that’s the time they pull up. We just have to play, just like what I always tell them, we really have to play 48 minutes of basketball,” he added.
For the side of Meralco, the last thing head coach Luigi Trillo wants to see from his charges is to dwell on the ‘what could have beens’ in that Game 2 loss. The one-time champion coach reiterated that he is sticking to his guns and his belief in his players never wavered even in the huge collapse.
“We had it but they made big shots. CJ, Marcio hit the biggest shots but I thought we played okay. We could have played better. We have to match their intensity too,” said Trillo.
“It’s a seven-game series. We’ll be heading to Game 3 and we’ll make adjustments. Even if we get that lead again there are so many things we need to improve on pa, so focus lang kami. Three games in five days,” he added.
After leading the scoring for the Bolts in Game 2, Cliff Hodge is primed to try and do it all anew in Game 3 but he will need the A-games of Chris Banchero, Chris Newsome, Allein Maliksi and Bong Quinto on both ends of the floor.
Although being limited by the big man rotation of Meralco, June Mar Fajardo remained the focal point of attack for San Miguel.
“We are very fortunate to get this win today and to tie the series. Our mindset now, it boils down to a best of five na lang so we need to watch the film again, the good and the bad,” added Gallent.
