The drought is over. ‘Rain’ is back.
Rain or Shine stopped a three-game losing skid with a much-needed victory after humiliating NLEX, 121-94, to keep its hopes of making the next round alive in the 2016 Philippine Basketball Association Commissioner’s Cup last night at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
Antoine Wright finally showed up as hepaced the Elasto Painters with a near triple-double of 20 points, eight rebounds and seven assists while getting tons of support from his teammates.
Six more Painters scored in twin-digits with Jewel Ponferrada dropping 15 markers, Raymund Almazan 14, Jeff Chan, Jericho Cruz and JR Quinahan each with 12 and Maverick Ahanmisi adding 10 more.
It’s a huge win for the Painters as this enabled them to figure in a five-way logjam with NLEX, who slipped to the lower echelon with this second straight loss, Talk ‘N Text, GlobalPort and Blackwater for spots 6-10 in the standings with similar 2-3 records.
It’s also a huge sigh of relief for Rain or Shine coach Yeng Guiao.
“We finally got our rhythm back. I hope it’s not too late and I hope we can be consistent with it,” he said. “We got out running game back as well as our rebounding and that really helped us.”
Having the urge to gain a much-needed win, Rain or Shine showed up with a lot of desperation, launching a massive attack in the opening period to dictate the game and grasp command.
The Elasto Painters, through seven early points from surprise starter Jeric Teng, planted a booming 16-0 bomb to open up a huge upperhand, a 15-point lead, 23-8, with just over four minutes to go in the first.
The Bolts showed a bit of resistance early in the second, bringing down the gap to just single-digits on several occasions, but the determined Painters quickly restored their double-digit lead and ended up with a very comfortable 58-43 leverage at halftime after a buzzer-beating triple from Wright.
From that point, it was all Rain or Shine, which was never in danger the rest of the way as the game was already broken wide open.
Game Today (Legazpi City)
5 p.m. – San Miguel vs. Meralco