MANILA – San Miguel-Alab Pilipinas renewed its mastery of Mono Vampire of Thailand after a 110-100 overtime win in the 2018-2019 ASEAN Basketball League on Sunday night at the Sta. Rosa Multi-Purpose Complex in Laguna.
Puerto Rican reinforcement Renaldo Balkman led the way with 38 points for the defending champions Alab Pilipinas, which has tallied its second consecutive win to improve to 8-2 win-loss slate.
This was the first meeting between the two teams since their epic five-game championship series a year ago that was won by Alab Pilipinas behind the heroics of Balkman and Justin Brownlee.
The Vampire seemed to have not yet moved on from the championship defeat as it pounded on the Alab Pilipinas early on to build its largest lead of the match at 13 points in the third period.
Alab, however, leaned on Balkman’s dominance inside and Bobby Ray Parks Jr.’s outside sniping to cut into the deficit at the end of three quarters before forcing overtime in the tightly-contested fourth quarter.
In the extension period, Balkman conspired with Ethan Alvano and Caelan Tiongson in a huge 12-7 scoring run for a 102-96 lead. It grew further to double figures after a conversion by Parks.
After playing consecutive matches in the first two weeks of the 2019, the Jimmy Alapag-mentored Alab Pilipinas will have a week-long break before playing host to Hong Kong Eastern Long Lions./PN
