“Bad game.”
That was all Meralco Bolts head coach Norman Black could say after Wednesday night’s match against the league-leading San Miguel Beermen in which they lost, 101-86.
“That’s all I can really tell you. We got off to a horrible start. We couldn’t defend the perimeter. We couldn’t defend the paint. We [even] got down by 30,” said a dejected Black.
Black has all the reasons to feel down with the recent defeat. Not just because it came via blowout, but also because of the fact that Wednesday night’s loss marked their third straight in six outings.
And for tonight’s game in particular, the head coach blamed the Bolts’ miscues, which proved to be detrimental to their rally in the fourth quarter where they closed in by just nine, 88-79, with 5:43 left.
“Turnovers cost us this particular game. We were coming back but crucial turnovers, they really set us bad,” the 59-year-old mentor rued, lamenting the 19 turnovers the Bolts committed overall.
Setting the loss aside, the Bolts received notable performances from guards Baser Amer and Joseph Yeo, who scored 12 markers each, with their baskets keeping Meralco alive the whole game.
But despite such, Black still was not pleased by the individual performances his backcourt tandem had.
“They played well. But I can’t really take anything positive from this game. It’s a bad performance overall from everybody. I don’t know if I can take too many positives from tonight’s game,” he remarked.
After being marked as one of the must-watch teams entering the conference, Meralco is now down with a dismal 2-4 card. With this scenario, Black admitted that him and the Bolts are about to push the panic button with the way things are turning out for them in the Philippine Cup.
“There is a bit of urgency, yes. We don’t want to get eliminated. We have to start getting performances from everybody. Otherwise, we’ll get stuck at the bottom four,” Black stressed.
“First thing we can do is go back to practice and work really hard. We’ll work on our weaknesses. Take a look at the tape and see what went wrong and try to fix it.”
