Air21, TNT win -- March 14, 2007

By JAY R. GOTERA

The Saudi Gazette

MANILA

SHOWING no mercy, Air21 thumped a badly crippled San Miguel squad, 88-78, Wednesday night at the Araneta Coliseum to register its second win in the PBA Fiesta Conference.

The Beermen played their hearts out but couldn’t match the firepower and strength of an Express team beefed up by do-it-all import Shawn Daniels.

In contrast, San Miguel got zero point from its temporary import, Vidal Massiah, whom substitute coach Biboy Ravanes was forced to bench for most parts of the game for being ineffective in both offense and defense.

Massiah, a former member of the Canadian national team, was just a last-minute import recruit of San Miguel after original choice Kelly Whitney was measured to be over the 6-6 height limit. He was a walk-in applicant and could get his walking papers after his miserable performance in Wednesday night’s game.

The Beermen lost their opening game in the tourney against Red Bull, 84-102, last Friday. Its second loss Wednesday marked the first time that San Miguel lost its first two games in a tournament.

Aside from problems with its import, San Miguel also played minus Danny Ildefonso and Lordy Tugade who both aggravated their injuries in their last game. The Beermen were also without ace gunner Danny Seigle and Hontiveros who have been selected for the Philippine national basketball team.

San Miguel also lost its coach, Chot Reyes, to the national team.

On the other hand, Air 21 found itself tied for the lead with Red Bull and Alaska after its second win in the conference. the Express whipped the Sta. Lucia Realtors, 101-94, last Wednesday.

In the first game, Talk ‘N Text made a key run midway in the fourth quarter to beat Coca-Cola, 102-87, the Phone Pals’ first win in the conference.

James Sullinger went running and gunning all night, while Anthony Washington and Egay Billones were always there whenever the game was on the line as they helped the Phone Pals rebound from a 94-98 loss to Alaska Milk last March 7.

The fleet-footed Sullinger scored 35 points and grabbed 12 rebounds for the Phone Pals, who fought the Tigers three fourths of the way before gaining a smooth ball movement that keyed them to the big win.

“I think we played as a team tonight. We had pretty nice shot selection, unlike in our game against Alaska,” Talk ‘N Text coach Derek Pumaren said after the win.

“We did well defensively and we had nice ball movement all night,” Pumaren added.

The win actually came rather hard for the Phone Pals, as they had to fight tenaciously for three full quarters, before Washington struck for a winner and Billones a triple in the return play to give Talk ‘N Text an 81-76 advantage.

After posting that lead, the Phone Pals went smoothly the rest of the way. They even got more breaks as against the Tigers, who were hounded by errors and misses in the stretch.

“Our defense forced them to plenty of misses in the end. But off course, I’d like to mention Egay Billones for his timely triples,” Pumaren said.

Anthony Johnson, Coke’s hard fighting import, had just put Coca-Cola within 71-81 with 8:50 left with a jumper, when Don Allado sank two free throws, Billones came away with the second of his three treys for the night while Harvey Carey and Washington came through with a basket each in 9-0 blitz that enabled the Phone Pals to move farther away at 90-78, with 6:49 left.

Coca-Cola failed miserably in its effort to turn the game in its favor as errors and offensive miscues ruled them, although they managed to move a little bit closer at 83-90 on a triple by John Arigo, Billones quickly negated that with his own triple.

That proved to be the last stand for the Tigers, who absorbed their first loss after two victories.

Anthony Johnson finished with 39 points and 14 rebounds as he actually got the better of his head-to-head duel with his Talk ‘N Text counterpart, but his points did not come when needed most.