SUDDEN DEATH SATURDAY
From mid-2008 through Thursday night, Alaska and Rain or Shine have been engaged in a fierce rivalry of their own, evenly splitting their 28 head-on matches.
And it’s a tough call as the Aces and the Elasto Painters meet Saturday in a sudden death for the second berth in the PLDT Home Telpad PBA Governors’ Cup finale.
They play at 5 p.m. at the Smart Araneta Coliseum with the loser hitting the end of the road in the season and the triumphant squad breaking into the best-of-five title playoff versus the San Mig Coffee Mixers.
Both teams are expected to come out and gut it out harder than they did in their four previous games.
In five games that they have played in the conference, no team has won two in a row.
The Elasto Painters try to break the trend, hoping to follow up their Game Four victory to get a second Finals stint in PBA Season 39.
The Philippine Cup losing finalists forced the rubber match with their gripping 123-121 overtime win in Game Four Thursday.
“We tried hard. We tried to extend it to Game Five. Now, our focus is on that game,” said Rain or Shine coach Yeng Guiao.
Big breaks in the crunch helped the Elasto Painters extend life in the series.
The Aces had a chance to salvage the game but Jayvee Casio misfired a three-point attempt in the closing seconds of overtime play.
Earlier, in a terrible episode for Alaska, Casio slipped on a wet portion of the floor while going for a breakaway layup that could have given the Aces a 123-121 edge with 33.9 ticks left.
Another big blow for the Aces was losing import Henry Walker on a flagrant infraction on Paul Lee with 6:24 left in regulation play.
Walker was to appear before league commissioner Chito Salud at 5 p.m. Friday. He’s likely to be slapped a fine but very unlikely to be suspended for the Saturday sudden death.
All series long, Walker had been complaining of what he alleged as Rain or Shine’s dirty tactics. Alas, he was the one tossed out of the court Thursday for a flagrant infraction.
“He’s a menace to the league. He’s a bully,” said Guiao.
Alaska coach Alex Compton hopes that they will able to refocus their attention on the game and come out triumphant to do the Last Dance. (SB)
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