Rain or Shine head coach Yeng Guiao. Photo by Tristan Tamato/INQUIRER.net
Friday the 13th had been a bad day for coach Yeng Guiao.
Rain or Shine blew its chance for a sweep, losing to Alaska, 111-99, in game 4 on Friday.
But Guiao believes that the Elastpainters, who are holding a superior 3-1 lead, could wrap it up some other time.
“We still feel we will win this championship, not just on a Friday the 13th, but maybe on a Sunday the 15th,” he said. “It’s a better day.”
In contrast to its stupendous showing in the first three games, Rain or Shine looked out of sync in Game 4, turning the ball over 13 times in the first half which all contributed to a 15-point deficit early.
“We couldn’t get anything going in the first half. We couldn’t get our momentum going,” said Guiao.
Not helping was Alaska’s best shooting performance for the series, as the Aces went 54-percent from the field to further bury Rain or Shine. Guiao said, “This was probably their best shooting night in the series. It just means that we probably were not working hard enough challenging their shots because a lot of those shots were open.”
Still, there’s no doubt in Guiao’s mind that he and his team will figure things out and wrap the series up on Sunday.
“We will make some adjustments with our defense. (Rob) Dozier has just been scoring at will at the isolation at the post, so we have to look for something to solve that,” he said,adding that their own import has also been dealing with back injuries of his own. “P (Henderson-Niles) was not feeling good about his back. He didn’t practice yesterday, so we hope his back is a little better tomorrow,” he said.
“The championship is postponed for now, but it’s well on its way,” Guiao vowed. “We will try to have the balloons fall on Sunday.”