A revitalized June Mar Fajardo (with ball) gives Leo Austria plenty of reasons to be optimistic. —PBA IMAGES
San Miguel Beer’s 99-91 overtime loss to Hong Kong in the PBA Commissioner’s Cup on Sunday night amounted to a double black eye for the traditional powerhouse.
Following their East Asian Super League match earlier last week, the Beermen have now suffered back-to-back setbacks at the hands of the Hong Kong club. The Beermen also failed to give their new import Jabari Narcis an exciting start to his PBA career, which made for terrible optics since Torren Jones was undefeated since taking over Quincy Miller.
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But all this did little to shake the confidence of returning coach Leo Austria.
“There was still an opportunity for us to win, especially in the regulation,” the champion coach told reporters shortly after the clash at the PhilSports Arena in Pasig City that dropped San Miguel to 7th place with a 3-3 win-loss card.
“We had the last shot. We just weren’t able to execute the timeout properly. We had a chance, so I told (the players) there was nothing to be ashamed of,” he added.
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The defeat was the first blemish on Austria’s PBA record since reclaiming his position in the dynastic franchise. A win would not only have evened their EASL-PBA trilogy with Eastern, but it would also have given the Beermen a positive end to the year.
Austria said the players may still be adjusting to Narcis, a 6-foot-9 player from Trinidad and Tobago who the masterminds trusted and the players chose for replacing Torren as a PBA import who has only been practicing for two days. But there was also no denying that the team was an eyesore throughout the competition.
“It was actually an ugly game because we gave up 25 points on 22 turnovers. Can you imagine? This represents a quarter of our assets,” he stressed. “He’s the culprit.”
Christmas break
Narcis, for his part, was decent, scoring 28 points on 11-of-29 shooting and 10 rebounds. He didn’t trouble cornerstone June Mar Fajardo, who finished with 23 points, 18 rebounds and five assists. CJ Perez and Marcio Lassiter were also productive, finishing with at least 13 points each.
And this is one of the reasons why Austria remains unfazed.
“(Imagine) if (everything we try to teach) had become second nature (to everyone); and when will players finally have some fluidity in the game? » asked the nine-time champion trainer.
San Miguel is now on Christmas vacation and will return to work on December 26. Except for the New Year festivities, Austria said it will work tirelessly to prepare a whirlwind January schedule that will kick off against the much-anticipated Barangay Ginebra.
This clash with a corporate sibling will be followed by another against Magnolia. The Beermen then face higher-ranked teams Meralco, NorthPort and Converge until they face Governors’ Cup titlist TNT by the end of the month.
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“I think come playoff time, if we get there, we’re going to have a different ball game,” he said.
