NLEX head coach Yeng Guiao could not hide his frustration after the Road Warriors lost badly at the hands of an incomplete Alaska Aces on Friday night, which put a bitter end to their campaign in the 2019 PBA Philippine Cup.
Friday’s game was the playoff for the eighth and final spot for the quarterfinals. The winner set up a meeting with the surprise top-seed Phoenix Pulse Fuel Masters, who are armed with a twice-to-beat advantage.
“Of course, we’re very disappointed,” rued the outspoken bench strategist moments after the match.
“I thought we could at least give ourselves a chance to win the game but we never got to the point where we threatened Alaska eh.”
The game was already in favor of the Aces as early as the second quarter, when the Milkmen limited the Road Warriors to just eight points. They also pumped in 21 markers to turn a narrow six-point lead to a 44-25 lead at the half.
NLEX showed signs of life late in the game as they chopped down a 28-point lead to just 10, 76-86, with 1:09 left to play. But Guiao was still dissatisfied with their efforts, saying it wasn’t enough to say that they put up a good fight.
“I guess the more disappointing thing to us is that we were not able to give ourselves a chance to be in the game and put a little more pressure on Alaska,” said Guiao, whose side committed 22 turnovers, 16 in the first half alone.
“We know this is our most important game this conference, but we did not play it the way the occasion was called for,” Guiao furthered. “The least that I was expecting them to do was to just give this game a fight. Yun yung wala.”
Though four Road Warriors managed to rack up double-digit performances, Guiao still saw nothing that satisfied him.. He even went as far as admitting that he missed the services of his star guards Kiefer Ravena and Kevin Alas.
“We missed sorely Kevin and Kiefer at the point guard position. We need some steady point guard work, which I felt was lacking with our point guards. And to compound our problems today was even our big men did not do well,” he said.
“So both our guard position and the frontline position’s performances were really disappointing.”
After Friday’s defeat, the Road Warriors concluded their campaign with just four wins in 12 outings. But the decorated mentor isn’t dwelling on the loss, as his sights are now set on the 2019 Commissioner’s Cup.
“Pero yun nga, sabi ko nga we cannot dwell on this loss. Even if it’s a big loss for us and it’s a disappointing loss, we cannot dwell on it. We need to be positive for the next conference and we will try to regroup,” said Guiao.
“We’ll take a break and resume practice after the Holy Week.”
Asked if the Road Warriors already have a reinforcement for the mid-season joust, Guiao gave away no information except that he will have somebody who has already seen action in the Filipino pro league before.
“Oo, naglaro na rito. Pero ayaw namin sabihin pa muna kung sino,” Guiao said.
“Baka may mangyari pa, or baka maalala ng ibang team.”
