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TNT not letting guard down vs Meralco as it seeks 2-0 edge
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TNT Ka Tropa coach Jong Uichico knows Meralco will try and come up with something new when the two teams square off anew Wednesday in their PBA Goverors Cup semifinals duel at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
“Meralco can come back. We can’t let our guards down,” said Uichico moments after his Texters’ 113-85 win in the best-of-five series opener last Tuesday.
Indeed, the Bolts are sure to make the necessary adjustments, especially on the defensive end, as they try to avoid falling into a very deep 0-2 hole.
“It’s a do-or-die tomorrow because it will be almost impossible to come back from a 0-2 deficit,” said Meralco coach Norman Black.
“We just have to play much better.”
Black is taking his cue from what went wrong for them in the opener, when TNT was able to completely shred their defense in the second half.
“We did everything defensively against them today,” bared Black during during a post-game interview.
“We trapped them, we went under (screens), we went over, we switched it, we even zoned and nothing really worked. We tried just about every defense we could come up with today.”
The Texters simply would not be beaten on that particular night, even if some of the Bolts’defensive schemes went as planned.
“We tried to pick our poison as far as what we’re going to defend but when Talk N Text is playing like that it’s really difficult,” said Black.
Matching TNT basket-for-basket would have been an option, but Meralco’s guns were eerily silent, particularly main snipers Jimmy Alapag and Jared Dillinger, despite some good looks.
Alapag was good for only eight points on 3-for-10 shooting while Dillinger missed his first seven shots before finishing 5-for-15 and 12 points.
That made life extremely difficult for Allen Durham, who wound up with gamehighs of 26 points and 21 rebounds, but had to scratch and claw for most of those.
“That’s the problem,” noted Black. “If you go back to our entire conference, when he (Dillinger) shoots well we play well. If he doesn’t shoot well, we normally lose. It really affects AD (Durham) because he needs a floor spacer. Basically, nobody really clicked from the outside and the defense just stood in the middle. So what’s really happening is that they’re all concentrated on AD.
“When JD comes in and makes some outside shots it opens everything up for AD.”
No such problems bugged TNT as Michael Madanly waxed hot in the second half for 20 of his 22 points, Troy Rosario made six of eight shots, including 4-for-5 from beyond the arc, for 16 points and Mychal Ammons also got into the groove in the final 24 minutes for 15 points and 11 rebounds.
Even Jayson Castro found his rhythm in the second half to finish with 14 points and nine assists. Seven of his points and five of his dimes came in the third quarter when he presided over a breakaway from the last tie at 45 and into an 84-67 spread going to the final canto.
As a team, the Texters went 24-for-84 from the field after a 16-for-42 shooting in the first half and made 15 of their total 30 three-point tries.
“You do not want to get into a scoring game with Talk N Text because they can outscore any team in the league,” said Black. “What we really wanted to do was to run when we have the opportunities and slow it down when we did not.
“But I don’t think it had too much to do with the pace of the game but more on their ability to make outside shots. They shot the ball extremely well, 15 out of 30 is a very high percentage from three points and any team shooting like that, they’re going to have a good chance of winning.”
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