With Star stuck at the bottom half of the 2016 PBA Governors’ Cup, James Yap was at loss for words following the team’s 109-100 defeat to San Miguel on Sunday evening.
“Di ko na rin alam,” he said.
Coach Jason Webb also didn’t mince with words as the Hotshots’ lackadaisical start against the Beermen proved to be the team’s undoing late in the game.
“We didn’t deserve to win today. We came out there like we were playing back-to-backs. No energy,” he said.
San Miguel jumped to an early lead, holding a 56-39 edge at the half which would go up to 20, 65-45 early in the third. Though Star made a huge fightback to close in within five, 88-83 midway in the fourth, June Mar Fajardo and Chris Ross fueled another tear to put the game away late.
But at 1-3, Webb acknowledges that there’s no more time for the Hotshots to be down and would rather look at it at a positive light as the team eyes a better showing after the All-Star break.
“I always want to look at the good about it. We made a game out of it, but if you dig yourself a hole as bad as we dug ourselves in, sometimes, hindi ka talaga makakalabas sa butas na yun. We can’t allow that to happen,” he said.
Amid criticism of the team’s poor showing in the season-ending conference, Webb refused to pin the blame on anyone, especially import Marqus Blakely who had 15 points and 21 rebounds but committed 10 turnovers in the defeat.
Coming to the defense of his reinforcement, the first-year head coach said that he still hasn’t thought of replacing the former Best Import.
“This is a team. Unless there is a circumstance where we can say that this is the reason that we’re losing, first, we have to look at ourselves – coaches, other players –and we’ll decide from there,” he said.
“Faith will always be there in our players, from our first guy to the last guy, and we’re just hoping that guys will come up and play their best. As long as they’re trying, then we’ll be on their corner.”
“The imports and the teams are just too good right now. Remember, Marqus Blakely was the benchmark a few years ago,” he furthered.
“Other teams, they’re telling their agents: ‘I want a guy better than Marqus Blakely.’ Now on our end, we’re hoping that Marqus is able to become a better player because yung mga kalaban namin, kumukuha sila ng mas magaling sa kanya o kay AZ (Reid).”
But Blakely’s bad game also did not go unnoticed by Webb.
“(Blakely) got a triple-double, but we were hoping na hindi turnover yung isa dun.”
“I think he was the same as last game, that he didn’t really come out strong tapos in the second half, he was much better. But we need 48 minutes of that. I play him 40 or so, so we need 40 minutes of that,” he said.
Webb, though, will have two weeks to assess his team and come up with a winning formula to turn things around for the once proud franchise.
“We’re still going to play basketball. It doesn’t change,” he said.
“We just got to be better defensively. I thought we would be better defensively this conference, but we’re terrible.”
