Shooting a lot of three-point attempts has been the trend in global basketball. But when the shots are not falling, it can get ugly.
Second year TNT head coach Nash Racela lamented the way the Katropa throwed bricks against the Rain or Shine Elasto Painters Friday night — a poor shooting performance that unfortunately led to a bad start to their 2018 PBA Philippine Cup campaign.
“We need to shoot at a better percentage. We took one hundred two attempts and only made thirty percent of those,” rued the youthful head strategist after their 79-82 defeat at the Cuneta Astrodome in Pasay City.
It was not the night of the Katropa with the way they hoisted up shots. TNT converted just eight of their 38 launches from beyond the arc, and they failed to capitalize on their free throws as they sank just nine out of 19 attempts.
TNT’s shooting woes sent into tatters the excellent job they have done in other facets. They owned the boards (73-54), dished the ball better (18-13), blocked more shots (8-5), and forced more errors (19-16) than their counterparts.
Despite the loss, Racela still saw a silver lining. Beyond the hustle stats, the Texters showed grit even with a bad shooting night as they nearly forced an overtime had their end-game triples went in.
“We played a lot better in the second half. We were able to minimize our mistakes,” said Racela, as the Katropa even pulled off a 17-4 rally early in the final frame to snatch the lead, 68-66, and threaten Rain or Shine.
“The energy was still there despite missing shots — we were trying to get shots off those misses, which is a good sign for us,” the UAAP champion coach furthered.
“But then again, we’d rather have us making our attempts.”
After the forgettable opener, Racela and TNT now have their sights on the Alaska Aces, a team they will face on December 29. And for that match, the youthful tactician hopes that they can regain their groove offensively.
“For sure, they’ll force us to take the outside shots again so it’s a challenge for us to make it from the outside.”
