San Miguel holds off undermanned Rain or Shine in season opener

MANILA, Philippines – The San Miguel Beermen made sure to give new team head coach Leo Austria a victory in his first game coaching the legendary franchise.

It didn’t come easy, even if luck was on their side as their opponents were missing the services of three rotation players, but the Beermen managed to hold off the Rain or Shine Elasto Painters’ numerous runs in the fourth quarter to come away with an 87-79 win on Tuesday, October 21, at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.

“I’ve been away for one year. And it’s nice to see you again,” said Austria, whose last coaching gig was with the undeperforming 2013 Adamson Falcons in the UAAP Season 76 men’s basketball tournament.

“This is my first game with San Miguel and we won. And I think this will be a great motivation for me and the team,” he later said.

Arwind Santos had 16 points and 13 rebounds and hit a couple of timely jumpers down the stretch while Gilas Pilipinas big man June Mar Fajardo contributed 16 points on 6-of-7 shooting and 10 rebounds for San Miguel, which had only 7 active players in practice last week.

But despite having to fight through injuries and other concerns during the offseason, SMB looked like a different and more impressive team in the win.

“My own system,” Austria said about his team’s style of play. “Yung dating sistema inalis namin dahil hindi nag wo-work.” (We took out the old system because it wasn’t working).

“I hope this will be a good start for us,” he said.

The Elasto Painters played without Chris Tiu (hamstring) and Gabe Norwood (still hasn’t returned from his vacation in the United States), and lost star point guard Paul Lee to a hyperextended knee in the second quarter.

Raymond Almazan led ROS with 12 points and 11 rebounds, while Jervy Cruz pitched in 11 markers.

Being the more aggressive team to start the third quarter, Rain or Shine opened the second half on an 8-1 run that trimmed their opponents’ lead to 5, 50-45, following a breakaway layup by Ryan Araña.

However, the Elasto Painters’ rally was cut short by the Beermen, who went on an 8-0 run capped off by easy baskets from the PBA MVPs over the last two seasons, Fajardo and Santos, 58-45.

The rest of the game followed a similar theme, as Rain or Shine continuously managed to get close to tying the game or taking the lead, only for San Miguel to have an answer every time to stay on top.

With under 3 minutes to go in the contest, a struggling Jeff Chan hit a crucial 3-ball that put the scoreboard at 79-77 in favor of San Miguel – the closest his team had been since the first half.

But once again, the Elasto Painters couldn’t capitalize on their run and allowed the Beermen to score easy points on layups and at the free throw line, paving the way for the win.

“They are the contender,” Austria said about the Elasto Painters, now 0-1 in the 2015 PBA Philippine cup. “And everybody’s trying to do well in this conference, especially yung mga veterans namin.” (especially our veterans).

Chris Lutz and Lassiter played well, combining for 24 points. The Beermen shot only 40% from the field, but limited their adversaries to only 38% shooting.

Both squads made a combined 31 free throws out of 58 attempts.

The Elasto Painters didn’t lead even for a single second against San Miguel, who is now 1-0 and tied atop the Philippine Cup league standings with Barangay Ginebra San Miguel and Kia Sorento.

The trio of Santos, Lassiter, and Lutz were lethal in the first half, combining for 28 points to help San Miguel build an early double-digit lead, 28-18, after the first quarter.

The start of the second period wasn’t smooth as well for Rain or Shine, who lost Lee after the star point guard hurt his right knee due to an awkward landing off a short jumper on the fastbreak at the 11 minute mark.

The Gilas playmaker stayed down on the ground for a while before being helped off the court by his teammates, and was deemed out of the game at the half after an initial diagnosis showed that he hyperextended his right knee.

Rain or Shine struggled to find offense for the remainder of the second quarter and was kept afloat by the timely baskets of Jonathan Uyloan and Jervy Cruz, who had 7 and 6 at the half, respectively.

Unfortunately for the Elasto Painters, their contributions weren’t enough to stop the Beermen from taking a 49-37 lead after 24 minutes of play.

Here are some photos of the game taken by Nuki Sabio/PBA Images

– Rappler.com