Sol Mercado delivered when Ginebra badly needed it
The Barangay was on the verge of falling down to a deep 0-3 hole against the Star Hotshots in Game 3 of their 2017 PBA Philippine Cup Semifinals, but luckily for them, Sol Mercado had enough clutch in him and saved Ginebra.
During the game’s final frame with Star up one, 60-59, Ginebra then rallied to a commanding 14-0 run to break the game wide open, 73-60, with 1:32 to go. And during that vicious scoring spree, Mercado contributed two triples, sending the Ginebra crowd into a fever pitch
As the final buzzer sounded, it was the wide-bodied Fil-American who led Ginebra, finishing with 16 markers on 6-of-14 shooting from the floor to go along with his two rebounds and a game-high six assists. And what a time for him to come alive after averaging just 8.0 points on 7-of-16 shooting during the first two games of the series.
It was definitely a valiant effort for the 32-year-old California native. But for him, Monday night’s series-extending victory is nothing but attributed to the defensive effort they dished out as a unit.
“It’s a collective effort,” said Mercado. “I think it was really our defense that won us the game. I mean, we held them to 29 percent shooting, so credit to our team defense,” added Mercado regarding Star, who shot just 27-of-92 from the floor.
“We played defense without fouling and gave them tough looks.”
Aside from Mercado’s notable outing offensively, his individual effort on defense was also noticed. During the whole Game 3, Mercado was tasked to defend Hotshots guard Paul Lee, who has been billed as the “Ginebra Killer” after averaging 17.5 points during the first two games of the series.
With him guarding and bodying up, Lee was limited to just a dismal seven points on 3-of-13 shooting, and also had a hard time facilitating for his teammates as he only had a single dime all throughout the 34 minutes he played.
“I just tried to get in his space, and give him tough looks. He hit a couple of tough shots but I just tried to limit his touches and give him tough looks.
“He’s key to their team, as you can see with the first two games. So definitely, you’d want to take pride in that,” shared the eight-year league veteran.
With the victory that sent them back aboard the best-of-seven series, Mercado insisted that Game 3’s victory is not yet something for the whole Barangay to celebrate about as it only brought them back in the battle.
“We haven’t done anything yet. I mean, we gotta win 3 more, so one game at a time. We know that they’re gonna come back, and the next one is a must-win as well.
“You can’t go down 3-1, so we gotta forget about this one. We can’t be too happy. We just did what we needed to do to stay in the series,” iterated Mercado.
