Peppery Painters eye 2-0 lead vs Beermen

VERSATILE Rain or Shine guard Gabe Norwood (right) stops San Miguel Beer import Tyler Wilkerson from scoring an easy basket in the paint in last night’s semifinal encounter at Smart Araneta Coliseum. AUGUST DELA CRUZ

UNDERDOG Rain or Shine is on a roll.

Undefeated thus far in the Oppo-PBA Commissioner’s Cup playoffs, the Elasto Painters shoot for a commanding 2-0 lead over San Miguel Beer in their best-of-five Final Four series today at Smart Araneta Coliseum in Cubao.

Game time is 7 p.m. with the Painters seeking to win a fourth straight playoff game and apply the pressure on the Beermen, who threw away an 18-point first-quarter lead in Game 1 on Sunday night to lose, 98-94.

Counting a sweep of Barangay Ginebra in the quarterfinals, the Painters are 3-0 in these playoffs and have beaten talented teams with taller men in the paint.

While coach Yeng Guiao admitted to have been surprised in sweeping the Gin Kings in their best-of-three series, he described the Game 1 victory over the Beermen as “one of those comebacks that will linger in your memory.”

Rain or Shine wasn’t the favorite against the Gin Kings, and the Painters are labeled as the terrible underdogs against San Miguel.

The Beermen won their two previous series, prevailing in seven of 10 games and bagging the conference titles.

But after being proven wrong by his boys during the halftime break on Sunday, Guiao admitted to entertaining positive thoughts on the outcome of this one.

“We are looking forward [to the rest of the] series which we might win,” Guiao grinned.

The Painters defeated a San Miguel crew that had its two best players—import Tyler Wilkerson and reigning two-time MVP June Mar Fajardo—in their finest forms, relying on defense in the stretch to pull off the win and give the Beermen something to think about for the rest of the series.

San Miguel coach Leo Austria said the sub-par performance of gunslinger Marcio Lassiter contributed to their recent predicament.

“He took too many bad shots,” Austria said of the 6-foot-3 Lassiter, who went 1-for-9 on Sunday and missed a triple try which would have erased a 95-94 San Miguel deficit.

San Miguel’s defense also looked lacking. The Painters rallied from that 18-point first-quarter deficit and from 10 down at the half without foul-troubled import Pierre Henderson-Niles for the entire third period.

The Painters nibbled away at a three-point deficit at the start of the fourth quarter before draining the shots that mattered in the stretch.