MAGNOLIA spent what turned out to be an extended two-week break toughening up after a painful loss to Ginebra.
The Hotshots showed up with a renewed resolve and fashioned a runaway 91-69 victory over Blackwater last night to seize the solo lead in the PBA Commissioner’s Cup at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
Ian Sangalang bucked a minor fall during warmup and showed the way with 17 points, to go with seven rebounds for Magnolia, while import Nick Rakocevic chipped in 17 markers, 15 boards, and two assists.
Jerrick Ahanmisi and Jio Jalalon also did their part with 14 and 13 points, respectively, for the Hotshots, who rebounded from a 97-103 setback at the hands of the Kings last Oct. 23 and rose to 6-1 on the night enigmatic forward Calvin Abueva reached a milestone as the pro league’s 50th member of the 1,000 offensive rebounds club.
The Bossing, coming off a 71-77 defeat to Converge eight days ago, absorbed their third straight loss for a 3-6 mark.
Assistant coach Jason Webb, who spoke in lieu of chief tactician Chito Victolero, said their charges were determined to redeem themselves, especially on the defensive end.
“First of all, you have to remember, coach Chito (Victolero) would always say na galing kami sa talo. We lost to Ginebra and ang haba ng break namin because we didn’t play last week. This is a bounce back game and that’s what we talked about in our preparations,” Webb said. “The guys responded and the key thing here is tonight is probably our best defensive game of the conference. That’s the key there — we got back to our identity of playing very good defense and that was what was precached the entire two weeks.
“We were supposed to play last Saturday, and I think we felt we were sharp already. There was actually a fear na baka masunog iyong players because they were really, really sharp during practices,” he added.
After falling 19-22 in the first quarter, Magnolia zoomed to a 44-37 spread at the halfway mark.
The Hotshots stretched the gap to 70-55 heading into the final canto and led by as much as 87-62 on an Adrian Wong jumper in the last 2:00.
Ato Ular carried the fight for Blackwater with 14 points and four caroms, while Trevis Jackson got 10 markers.
