San Miguel Beermen Basketball Games Updates

Photo Credit: PBA.ph

After a second try at grabbing solo leadership, San Miguel Beer finally get it done by hammering the Sta. Lucia Realtors, 89-71 in a brilliant display of defensive prowess.

It was the best game in the conference so far for San Miguel Beer in terms of defense by holding Sta. Lucia to just 71 points. More importantly, San Miguel Beer limited Sta. Lucia’s mainman Kelly Williams to just a three point shot in the game, earning him his lowest output in his career so far. This was attributed to a minor back pain he sustained in practice.

Lordy Tugade topscored for San Miguel Beer with 19 points but it was Dorian Pena who greatly contributed for the win with 15 points, 9 rebounds, and 5/8 field goal. He practically bulldozed Sta Lucia’s bigmen after dominating them in the paint by getting rebounds and scoring underneath the basket.

Both Danny Seigle and Marc Pingris watched the games in civilian clothes together with their partners as they remain in sidelines recuperating with their respective injuries.

To give you more insights as to how San Miguel Beer whips the Sta. Lucia Realtors, kindly read the full news story below courtesy of Philippine Basketball Association (PBA.ph).

SAN MIGUEL VAULTS TO TOP AS REIGNING MVP STRUGGLES
SLR’s Williams out of sync, records career-low 3 pts
Thursday, October 30, 2008

Reigning MVP Kelly Williams threw bricks all night and San Miguel Beer took advantage to get past Sta. Lucia Realty and into the solo lead in the 2008-09 KFC PBA Philippine Cup at the Ynares Sports Arena in Pasig Thursday night.

With a far better field goal shooting, the Beermen walloped the Realtors, 89-71, and surged atop the leaderboard with a 5-2 win-loss record, relegating the Alaska Aces (4-2) to second place.

“We take pride in our defense,” said San Miguel Beer head coach Sito Tanquincen.”It was our defense which gave us that four-game win streak which we had earlier (in the conference). We know we can shoot the ball but its our defense that allows us get opportunities to score.”

Lordy Tugade, Dorian Pena, Jay Washington, Bonbon Custodio and Dondon Hontiveros scored at least 11 points each, leading the Beermen past the Realtors who struggled with main man Williams firing blanks.

Williams had a miserable 1-of-17 shooting, missing his first 15 attempts from the field and nailing his lone basket – a trey – with only 1:10 left to play and the outcome long settled by the Beermen. It was a new career-low output for the usually prolific Fil-Am forward, No. 4 in the league in scoring last year with an average of 18.2 points a game. His previous low was five which he scored twice before.

“Wesley (Gonzales) and Jay Wash (Washington) did a good job on Kelly. He’s Sta. Lucia’s main man so we figured a way to limit his scoring. But I think he also had an off night that’s why he scored only that much. Its not too often you see Kelly missing that many but without taking away anything from our defense, I think it was a combination of both,” explained Tanquingcen.

While the Beermen converted 50 percent of their shots, the Realtors hit only at a 32.5 percent clip as they suffered a second straight defeat and slid to joint third with Talk ‘N Text, Rain or Shine, Air21 and Red Bull with identical 3-3 slates.

Tugade scored a game-high 19 points, including a three-pointer touching off the Beermen’s vicious 17-5 attack to close the game.

Both teams missed a key player with Ryan Reyes and Marc Pingris sitting out the game due to injuries.

Minus Reyes and with Williams out of sync, the Realtors still jumped the gun on the Beermen largely through the early exploits of Bitoy Omolon.

The Realtors accounted for all of the game’s first seven points and enjoyed a 10-point lead once in the first half.

But they just couldn’t keep the pace throughout with Williams groping for form.

The Beermen started and finished strong in the final half, scoring a convincing win to make up for their sorry loss to the Red Bull Barakos Saturday.

Washington showed up Williams in a matchup of two top draft picks, collecting 14 points and 12 rebounds. Pena, meanwhile, bulldozed his way to 15 points and nine rebounds.

Wesley Gonzales had only nine points but was a big help as San Miguel seized the momentum on a 14-3 opening run in the third period.

The Beermen never let up after surging ahead at 54-45.

Williams, the 2007 Rookie of the Year who went on to win league MVP honors last August, scored the first of his two lowest outputs in the league on January 10, 2007 in a 99-91 loss to Alaska in the 2006-07 Philippine Cup. In the same tournament almost a year later, or November 7, 2007 to be exact, he again scored five points but this time the Realtors won, 115-80, against Air21.  (NC/FM)

The scores:

San Miguel 89 – Tugade 19, Pena 15, Washington 14, Custodio 11, Hontiveros 11, Gonzales 9, Villanueva 6, Racela 2, Bono 2, Pennisi 0.

Sta. Lucia 71 – Omolon 15, Yeo 13, Espino 9, Gonzales 9, Aquino 7, Mendoza 6, Miranda 6, Williams 3, Coronel 3, Mamaclay 0, Daa 0.

Quarterscores:15-21, 40-42, 65-56, 89-71.

San Miguel Beer is on the winning track once again. Could this be the start of a longer winning streak? Before that, let’s have a toast first for grabbing the solo leadership for the first time this conference!

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