THE SAN Miguel Beermen and their supporters whoop it up after the “unbelievable” victory over the Alaska Aces Wednesday night. AUGUST DELA CRUZ
FOR MORE than a decade, they endured the ridicule of being labeled as a powerhouse team with very little success to show.
On Wednesday night, in a Game 7 that will go down in PBA history as one of the closest ever fought, the San Miguel Beermen finally realized their potential and ended a 14-year climb to the apex of the Philippine Cup once again.
“This is unbelievable,” San Miguel coach Leo Austria told the crowd— 22,511-strong—at Smart Araneta Coliseum after the smoke of the battle had cleared with his Beermen escaping with an 80-78 victory to end the finals series against Alaska with a final 4-3 count.
Everyone was sure it was just a slip of the tongue when Austria said that “it was unfortunate that we won.” His wards had battled tooth-and-nail against an Alaska side that simply refused to die.
Arwind Santos made perhaps the most dramatic three-pointer of his career in the final 43.7 seconds, capping the stirring perfomance of one that was rested for less than a minute of that classic game.
“That was a tough shot,” Alaska coach Alex Compton would later say. “He’s a jump shooter, and having played 47 minutes, and still having the legs to go that high, that was one tough shot to make.”
The win gave the Beermen their first all-Filipino crown since 2001, and considering how young their nucleus is, they definitely will have more shots at championships in the next few years.
June Mar Fajardo, the 6-foot-10 cornerstone who produced the league’s first “20-20” game by a local in a Game 7 of a title series, is just three years into his pro career and will be there to anchor future San Miguel campaigns.
The reigning season MVP and Best Player of the Conference scored 21 points and grabbed 25 rebounds on Wednesday night.
San Miguel took a gamble on Austria when Gee Abanilla couldn’t deliver last season, and the former Shell point guard responded on his very first try, albeit after sitting on pins and needles when Alaska was making, as Compton said, one of its “let’s get crazy” rallies—this one from 23 points down.
Austria made the players realize their roles in the team—that Fajardo is the first option and Santos a very close second— and achieved harmony on the court despite rumors that they clashed among themselves in the past.
That the Beermen won out in a series as close as this one gave them victory within a victory, as its young core was able to gut it out against possibly the most disciplined team in the league.
“I knew from the start that it would really be hard to beat Alaska,” Austria said. “Kung merong matigas ang ulo, sila ang pinakamatigas ang ulo (If there are hard heads, they’re the hardest). We were only able to recover from their big rally.
“I have to appreciate my players. They simply did not give up.”
As the kings of the hill again, the Beermen will be playing with the proverbial bull’s eye behind their backs from now on.