From the PBA Media Bureau
San Miguel Beer dropped an import-less Rain or Shine with a 129-116 beating to end their PBA Governors' Cup eliminations campaign with a win on Friday at the PhilSports Arena.
Mo Tautuaa and Vic Manuel each scored 23 points while CJ Perez also dished a double-double as the Beermen racked up their second straight win to finish with a 9-2 record.
The Beermen have a twice-to-beat advantage going to the playoffs.
San Miguel coach Jorge Gallent now has the luxury of time to fix what isn't right with his team.
"We just have to play good defense. We can't rely on our offense, we can't win. Our main goal is to work on our defense and let it trigger our offense. If we play bad defense our offense will suffer," said Gallent.
"We really have to work hard for 48 minutes in order to make it far in the playoffs."
Prompting Gallent's observation was Rain or Shine's 14-0 run in the second quarter that that rattled San Miguel.
In a period spanning the last two quarters, the Elasto Painters also threatened the Beermen with 12 straight points to come within 93-100 before San Miguel recovered behind Manuel and Tautuaa for a 13-0 counter.
"It was just the defense," said Gallent, visibly far from pleased despite his team's follow-up to its 120-106 conquest of NLEX last Wednesday that assured it of a top three finish.
"We just relaxed again on defense. The usual thing, we were up by 13 and then we relaxed again. They had a lot of open three-point shots that weren't contested."
Perez, Cameron Clark and Marcio Lassiter had 20 points each.
Gian Mamuyac's new career-high 23 points paced the E-Painters who officially wound up at 10th.
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