PUSHED against the wall by a gritty Phoenix side, Meralco found ways to fend off its foe’s furious fightback last night.
Proving steadier down the stretch, the Bolts carved out a 92-86 victory over the Fuel Masters for their second straight win and kept alive their top four bid in the PBA Governors’ Cup at the PhilSports Arena in Pasig.
Import KJ McDaniels scattered 19 points, to go with 16 rebounds, two assists, four steals, and five blocks for Meralco, while Aaron Black chipped in 18 markers, six boards and three dimes.
Chris Banchero and Cliff Hodge also had 13 and 12 points, respectively, for the Bolts, who bucked the absence of gunner Allein Maliksi, who served a one-game suspension after he was slapped with a flagrant foul penalty 2 in their 132-129 overtime decision over Converge three days ago and wound up their eliminations campaign with a 7-4 mark.
Phoenix failed to redeem itself from an 89-109 rout at the hands of defending champion Ginebra also last Friday and finished the eliminations with a 4-7 slate.
Meralco coach Norman Black admitted the Fuel Masters gave his charges fits.
“This was an interesting game mainly because coach Jamike (Jarin) really threw everything against us tonight. From 1-3-1 (defense) to 2-3 to switching zones from man to zone to man, he just gave us everything we could handle tonight,” Black said. “At first, we were having a difficult time recognizing what they were doing, and we finally settled on what we can do at everything no matter what he threw at us.”
“We just ran one or two things which really worked for us in the third and fourth quarters but that first half was really ugly and even up until the end it wasn’t really pretty,” he added.
The Bolts fell 47-49 at the half but got their bearings back and took a 73-68 buffer going into the payoff period.
The triumph seemed to be in the bag for Meralco after an Aaron Black three-pointer padded the Bolts’ lead to as much as 90-75 at the 4:45 mark of the fourth.
But Phoenix refused to lie down and die and went on a 9-0 blitz to close in at 84-90 on reinforcement D’vaughn Maxwell’s two free throws, only 52.6 ticks left.
But a Raymond Almazan breakaway slam dunk pegged a 92-84 game in the last 40.1 seconds.
A Tyler Tio jumper shoved the Fuel Masters to within 86-92 but that was enough in the remaining 27.0.
Maxwell carried the fight for Phoenix with 29 points and nine caroms, while Encho Serrano and Jason Perkins got 20 and 13 markers, respectively.
