Beermen vow to match Bolts' energy
MANILA, Philippines -- Matching the Meralco Bolts’ energy will be key for the San Miguel Beermen as they try to go up 2-1 in the PBA Philippine Cup finals, head coach Jorge Gallent said.
The two teams will be facing in a pivotal Game 3 on Sunday, 6:15 p.m., at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
After the Beermen’s series-tying Game 2 win, Gallent said that the team would need to match the spirited play of the Bolts in the next game to have a shot in getting the win.
“Meralco’s a tough team, they really grind hard and their energy is really high,” the coach told reporters.
“So, it’s just energy, we just need to match their energy. If we don’t match their energy, you can see that if our energy goes down, that’s the time they pull [away],” he added.
San Miguel came back from being down by four points in the final 26 seconds to win the contest, 95-94.
They avoided falling down to a 2-0 hole and finally defeated Meralco, which they have not beaten this conference yet before Game 2.
The Beermen also won by just one despite making more field goals and committing seven less turnovers against the Bolts.
Gallent stressed that they need to work on both the good and bad things they did coming into the third game.
“When we lost Game 1, we watched a lot of tapes and we just talked about it and decided what to do on our bad games and continue to get better on the good things we were doing on Game 1,” he bared.
“But the bad things we’re doing, we’ll just fix it and we’ll just adjust.”
CJ Perez and June Mar Fajardo will continue to be the focal point of the offense for the defending champions. The two led San Miguel in scoring, with the former unleashing 34 points while the latter had 17 markers and 13 boards.
Perez said that he will repay the trust the coaching staff has given him since donning the red, black, yellow and white of the Beermen.
“I’m just doing the right thing on defense and on offense. I do not want to destroy the trust of our coaches and I know since day 1, they have been trusting me,” he underscored.
“This Game 2 was very crucial, we just did our 110% but it isn’t perfect. But, we got the win and we will adjust on our mistakes.”
