San Mig Coffee Mixers eye clincher

JAMES Yap of San Mig Coffee tries to dribble past Jason Castro of Talk ‘N Text in Game 3 on Tuesday night. AUGUST DELA CRUZ

MANILA, Philippines — Tim Cone of San Mig Coffee has a lot of good memories with Philsports Arena. He won his first PBA championship there while with Alaska.

He comes back to the Pasig venue—the site of the PBA’s most glorious years—shooting for another crown Thursday and establish a modern day dynasty for the Mixers, who will try to finish off Talk ‘N Text in Game 4 of the Commissioner’s Cup Finals.

“It has been years since we last played there,” Cone said Tuesday night after a high-wire 77-75 win that put his Mixers on the verge of another championship, which would be the 17th of his career. “I’ve had some good memories there.”

Cone, though, was also quick to point out another thing: “Norman (Black, the Talk ‘N Text coach) also has good memories there. He won his Grand Slam (with San Miguel Beer) there.”

Cone will be coming into the 8 p.m. game also with good memories of the last game, but Black won’t.

In fact, after getting maximum effort from his players and still coming out on the losing end of Game 3, the mild-mannered Black had just one appeal.

“I just hope that the game is governed well, to give us a fair chance of winning,” Black said in the softest possible tone on Tuesday.

“I just think that contacts should be called evenly on both ends. If you call fouls on one team, the same should be called on the other end. It’s for the fairness of the game.

“They (referees) stopped calling fouls on San Mig after they (Mixers) picked up their fifth (team foul) in the fourth quarter,” Black said.

Richard Howell should step up offensively for the Tropang Texters if they hope to take this series to a deciding fifth game on Sunday.

In Game 3, Howell, who won the Best Import award, practically bled for his 10 points and was taken out of the flow by the San Mig defense in the stretch. James Yap has had a reawakening in the series and, together with Peter June Simon, remains to be the focal offensive weapons of the Mixers.

Marc Pingris was also all over the place defensively in Game 3, and would be relied upon again heavily Thursday, especially in trying to put the cuffs on whoever the hot player is at Talk ‘N Text.