Chris Newsome insisted that he simply played the quotient rule as he made a shot when everything was all but decided in the Meralco Bolts’ 106-90 win over the NLEX Road Warriors, Friday night at the SMART Araneta Coliseum.
The 6-foot-4 swingman sank a jumper with 1.6 seconds left to play — the last of his 30 points and the shot that set up the final score — but it drew the ire of Road Warriors head coach Yeng Guiao, saying that it’s uncalled for.
“I don’t really know what happened. I’m just playing basketball and I’m just following orders from my head coach. That’s all I can say about that one,” said Newsome moments after the match, where they collected their second win.
“As far as I know it’s the quotient rule and, like I said, I’m just following orders.”
Bolts head coach Norman Black defended his long-time player, insisting too that they would want to score as many as they can due to the quotient rule — a major factor that can make or break a team’s status for the playoffs.
“The rules are we play with a quotient and if I remember correctly one team got eliminated last conference when they didn’t have a higher quotient,” said the champion coach. “They didn’t get a chance to play a knockout game.
“We’ll just play by the rules, if the rules says that you have to win via quotient at the event of a tie, then we’ll try to score as much as we can. If they take that rule out, we’ll respect the game and not try to score at the end-game.
“Me as a coach, I’m not naive. I know that normally, if the game is over, the game is over. You don’t want to put it in the coach’s face or the other team’s face, but until the PBA changes the rules or something else… Then we’ll follow the rules,” Black added.
Guiao’s reaction to that shot somehow overshadowed the game’s result. But for Newsome, he’s glad that the Orangemen have gotten back on track, that they have gained momentum for their match on Wednesday versus San Miguel Beer.
“It was a good bounce back win because we lost a close one to Globalport last week,” he said.
“We definitely needed to have this one to get momentum heading into the SMB match, we all know that’s gonna be a tough one.”
