ROS take down Meralco in a scrappy battle of unbeatens

Rain or Shine overcame bucked a slow start in the first frame as they retained their pole position in the PBA Philippine Cup with a workmanlike 85-72 beatdown of Meralco in the first of the Saturday doubleheaders this afternoon at the Ynares Sports Arena in Pasig City.

In the battle of the unbeaten teams who stake their respective 2-0 cards, it was Chris Gavina’s Elasto Painters who had to come up on top of the Bolts to remain spotless with their third win on the trot, as both teams had to endure bad shooting display where they hit just 40% from the field for the entire game.

The former chemist praised the team’s next man up mentality in overcoming their initial struggles in the game.

“When your best players are your hardest workers, your culture gets set organically,” said Gavina after the game, in which he further emphasized the culture that the franchise have cultivated since its entry.

“Parang si Bobby Knight, he said that ‘the most prepared team are the hardest working team.’ It coincide with who we are and what our identity is. We want to be the hardest working team in the PBA”

Javee Mocon led all scorers with 18 points despite only shooting 5/13 from the field to go along with 6 rebounds and 6 assists, with frontcourt partner Beau Belga added a double-double of 17 markers and 11 boards.

The burly slotman echoed what his mentor had said in putting the hard work at all times.

“Everybody’s into it,” he said. “Ginugusto namin every gameday na talagang dumipensa kami. When it comes to offense, sabi namin sa sarili namin i-execute natin hanggang sa kung sino yung pinaka-libre.”

With him being one of the veteran leaders, he reminds their new teammates not to panic when they stepped into the court.

“Lagi ko nireremind sa kanila na wag sila mataranta. It’s more on mind games pagdating dito sa PBA.”

Chris Newsome had 13 for Norman Black’s side, in which they will have to rue their bad free throw shooting as one of the causes in losing for the first time in this short season, in which they only converted half of the 20 charities that they were given to them.

ROS were on the back foot to start the game when Meralco erected a first-quarter 10-point advantage, but the Painters turned it around in the middle quarters when they outscored the Bolts by 18 to turn it around and snap their unbeaten record in the process.

Despite being outrebounded by eleven, its second unit outscored by seven and outran in fastbreak scoring, ROS took advantage of the bad ball handling of Meralco, scoring 23 points off their 21 turnovers thanks in huge part in snatching the ball away from the Bolts a dozen times in the process.

The Scores:

RAIN OR SHINE 85 – Mocon 18, Belga 17, Nambatac 11, Torres 11, Wong 8, Borboran 7, Caracut 6, Norwood 5, Ponferada 2, Santillan 0, Tolentino 0

MERALCO 72 – Newsome 13, Almazan 10, Hodge 9, Hugnatan 9, Pinto 8, Quinto 7, Belo 4, Black 4, Maliksi 3, Jose 2, Canete 2, Jackson 1, Pasaol 0, Caram 0

Quarter scores: 13-18, 42-35, 68-55, 85-72
PHOTOS: PBA