PBA GovCup Finals: Llamados tie series, Lee hurt anew

Sabi nila me ibang Hari
na daw galing UE? Weh.

Welcome to the B-Meg Llamados' James Yap's show.

The two-time PBA Most Valuable Player reigned supreme on a night where the Barangay Ginebra Gin Kings' Mark Caguioa solidified his own PBA Season 37 MVP campaign by scoring back-to-back Best Player of the Conference citations and the Rain or Shine Elastopainters' rugged, do-it-all import Jamelle Cornley was recognized as the best reinforcement in the land.

With his team, once hailed the favorites, surprisingly caught off-guard and seemingly punked by the young Elastopainters, Yap responded with a sterling 24 points, 7  rebounds performance and sinking in the dagger MJ-like fadeaway with 15 seconds left and stretching the lead to four. There were times wherein Yap looked like he was forcing the issue a bit with WTF threes, but he was attacking the basket and helping underneath the boards.
Credit should also go to the Llamados' coaching staff for doing their homework on Cornley and using their deep bench to the hilt. Yancy de Ocampo finally got some points in and played like the 6"9 star he used to be. Rafi Reavis did a yeoman's job on Cornley all night defensively. PJ Simon played like his usual, steady sidekick self and just about anyone Coach Tim Cone sent in contributed to the Llamados' cause.

Perhaps the Llamados could consider keeping a steady ball-handler at all times for the rest of the series-- when the Elastopainters made a run in the closing seconds to narrow the gap, they did it via pressure defense. This ploy resulted in an ugly eight-second violation for the Llamados and a couple of near turnovers that surely would've caused Coach Tim to send something flying midcourt yet again.

All in all, a great performance by the Llamados specially Yap, Reavis and Simon-- whose defense on Jeffrei Chan forced Coach Yeng Guiao to look elsewhere. Really, another defensive performance like this from Simon and I'll go back to saying that he should be the team's go-to-guy. Okay, not really, but still. Great effort.

The Elastopainters on the other hand looked sluggish and a little too iso-happy. Perhaps brimming with a little too much confidence after their Game 1 victory, Coach Yeng's wards were slow to hustle for the ball and were content with one-on-one forays (a bad habit of theirs) before regrouping in the 3rd and 4th quarters. For a team that is not as talented as their opponents, the Elastopainters cannot afford to play lackadaisically. Cornley was being bottled up by the defense-- something that was to be expected, the locals weren't keeping their part of the deal and that cost them.

Coach Yeng also might have played some guys who were clearly off their game a little too long-- Ronjay Buenafe and Jireh Ibanes. Ibanes did a stellar job defensively in trying to hound either Yap or Simon (though they still exploded somewhat), but offensively he was just killing his own team with the ugliest of wide-open, step-in threes.

From a fan's perspective, this series gave this writer flashbacks of the recent NBA Playoffs match-up between the upstart Indiana Pacers and the favored Miami Heat. The Pacers were playing as a team and punking guys out with their physicality, but then the Heat realized that they can play the same way-- plus have more talent, and pretty much waltz their way to the next round from there.

Can Lee get back up to help RoS?

That being said, there's something else in the closing moments that could easily be a huge turning point in the series: Paul Lee re-dislocated his left shoulder.

On a bone-headed play in the 4th quarter, Lee reached out with his bad shoulder to try and swipe the ball from the Llamados' Simon and quickly fell to the floor in pain. Lee should've known better. If it took a Coach Tim to get the ball out of Simon's hands after xx years, how could a rookie expect to somehow force a turnover from the Scoring (re: not passing) Apostle?

Yes, the Elastopainters will still have Gabe Norwood (the PBA's Mr. Softie) and TY Tang (solid, but can't create offense for himself) to bring the ball down, but they're losing arguably their best one-on-one scorer and shot creator. It will be easier now for the Llamados to track down defensive assignments as while the ball will move better for the Elastopainters from side to side, kickout passes and out-of-thin-air plays will be reduced to a nil.

If Lee doesn't come back at even 60%, then this series is over in favor of the Llamados. 4-1, 4-2 at best for the Elastopainters.