JUMBO Plastic got a lot of help from its second unit and the severely depleted Giants toppled the MP Hotel Warriors, 94-57, on Monday in the Philippine Basketball Association Developmental League Aspirants Cup at the JCSGO Gym in Cubao, Quezon City.
The Giants set the tone of the rout early with strong rebounding and aggressive defense. They led 45-16 at halftime and went on to cruise to their second straight win since their bounce-back 81-65 win against Wang’s Basketball Thursday last week.
“We know [MP Hotel] weakness is the point guard spot. So we want their bigs to bring down the ball. I thought our full-court press held up. Our bench also made a difference in this game,” Jumbo Plastic Coach Stevenson Tiu said.
Marion Magat led the bench scoring by finishing with a game-high 18 points. Dennis Villamor had 13 points and Mark Cruz added 11 off the bench for the Giants, who improved to 4-1 (win-loss) record.
Jumbo Plastic played without center-forward McLean Sabellina, who showed up with a heavily bandaged right hand after fracturing his index finger the last game.
Forward Jan Colina, who missed the team’s first four games, also showed up with a heavily wrapped shoulder but played in the fourth quarter and finished with six points.
“He said he wanted to sweat. Our PT [physical therapist] gave him the go signal so we inserted him in the fourth quarter,” Tiu said.
Jumbo Plastic forced MP Hotel to 31 turnovers that led to a 31-10 edge off turnover points. The Giants also enjoyed a 58-34 advantage on points in the paint.
Hernal Escosio scored 11 points and Rhey Sumido added 10 for the Warriors, who had lost three straight and fell to 1-4 .
Meanwhile, Philip Paniamogan scored a game-high 22 points, including three three-point shots down the stretch and the AMA University Titans held on for an 83-76 victory against Racal Motors in the first game.
Jay-R Taganas also had a big game, finishing with 21 points that went with his 20 reboundss as AMA University smothered the Alibaba off the glass, 54-35, and improved to 2-3 (win-loss) record.
The Titans took the lead for good with a 6-0 run to close the second quarter. AMA took a 36-31 lead at halftime and stretched the margin to 22 (57-35) by shooting 11 of 16 attempts from the field (61 percent).
“I thought we did a good job with our pressure defense. It could have been an easy win but the guys kinda relax when we had a huge lead. Good thing we were able to keep our focus when they (Racal) made a run,” observed AMA coach Mark Hererra.
Kerwin Ortuoste led Racal Motors with 21 points. Jeff Viernes scored 15 points and Raymond Jamito added 12 for the Alibaba, which fell to 1-4.
With Ortuoste hitting his shots one after the other, Racal Motors put together a 30-11 run between the third and fourth quarters and pulled within three points twice at 63-66 and 65-68 midway in the fourth.
Then Paniamogan took over. He buried successive treys to spark an 11-7 run which he ended with another 3-pointer to give the Titans some breathing room, 79-72, with two minute remaining. Paniamogan was 5 of 13 from 3-point range.