Bolts take pole position

 ANTIPOLO, Philippines — Suleiman Braimoh provided the power as Meralco tripped Blackwater, 91-84, to grab solo pole position in the PBA Commissioner’s Cup yesterday at the Ynares Center.

Like in his 34-point debut two nights before, Braimoh was rock-solid and scattered 40 points, 16 rebounds and three steals in 43 minutes to lift the Bolts (2-0) to a huge followup to their opening 107-102 victory over Rain or Shine and the early lead.

Braimoh’s electric presence was felt the most in the fourth quarter, where he dropped 13, including a three-point play that gave Meralco an 85-75 cushion and later a transition dunk that made it an 87-80 elbow room.

The Nigerian-American reinforcement deflected credit to his local teammates.

“They found me in good spots, they trusted me and I’m happy I was able to make some shots today,” said Braimoh, who went 13-of-30 on the floor, including 3-of-8 from deep.

“Overall, it was a good team effort. We played hard, fought down to the end of the game. We got some key stops and got the win.”

While it was Braimoh who took the lion’s share of the Meralco offense in the final 12 minutes, Chris Newsome and Bong Quinto joined the fray in the closeout amid Blackwater’s late rally.

Newsome hit a dagger jumper for an 89-81 edge, then after Cliff Hodge grabbed the rebound off Chris Ortiz’ triple attempt, Quinto padded it to 91-81.

Ortiz finished with 29 for the Bossing, who failed to make it two in a row after an impressive 103-84 rout of Converge Wednesday.

“Blackwater is playing very well. They may not be as deep as the other teams but they play very well as a team,” said Meralco coach Luigi Trillo.

“They’re for real. Coach Jeff (Cariaso) is putting his imprint and you can see they play good defense. It was a struggle. There were multiple possessions in the fourth where nobody could shoot. We only had stepback and three-point shots and that’s credit to Blackwater.

The second straight win came at a cost as Meralco lost sniper Allein Maliksi to a fractured nose at the 7:43 mark of the second canto.