David’s 5th straight 30-point game gives Powerade series lead
At the end of the third period of last night's semifinal Game 3 between the Powerade Tigers and the Rain or Shine Elastopainters, I was sitting along press row at the Araneta Coliseum when a colleague of mine looked up at the gigantic jumbotron above and digested the numbers on the scoreboard.
The main figures showed the Tigers leading 69-64, but the one stat that stood out for my colleague was 11. That was the number of points Gary David had scored up to that point, and it appeared his streak of consecutive 30-point games, which stood at four entering last night's game, was in serious jeopardy.
My friend turned to me and said, "If he still scores 30 tonight, bilib na talaga ako sa kanya."
I then reminded him that David had scored only seven points midway through the third period of the Tigers' win over B-Meg in the quarterfinals, but ended up with 37 when the game was through. My colleague nodded in agreement. With that, we sat back and waited.
Sure enough, the sweet-shooting David went on to score 16 fourth-quarter points, including three pressure-packed free throws with 10 seconds left that sent the game into overtime, and added four more in the extension period to lift the Tigers to a 104-99 win and a 2-1 series lead.
"What can I say?" Powerade coach Bo Perasol said. "Gary David delivered in crunch time."
What made this latest fourth-quarter outburst more amazing was that David didn't score his first points in the payoff period until the 6:34 mark, a triple that tied the game at 77. He also was laboring through a poor shooting night, but he kept at it, because, in his own words, that's what shooters do. After Rain or Shine inched ahead by three once more, David buried another trifecta to once again tie the game. He scored another basket to give Powerade the lead at 82-80. After Paul Lee sank two free throws to tie the game again, David scored his 20th and 21st points to make it 84-82.
"Ang role ko, sabi nga ni Coach Bo, is to score," David said. "Hanggang hindi pa tapos ang laro, kailangan huwag mong isipin iyon. Kailangan tumira ka lang kahit na malas ka."
But despite his scoring outburst, the Elastopainters were poised to steal the win in regulation, going up by six, 95-89, with 1:57 left after Beau Belga split his free throws. After Perasol called a timeout, the Tigers set up David — who else — and he buried another triple to cut the lead to 95-92.
After an RoS miss, David a chance to tie the game, but - horror of horrors - he missed a wide-open triple. The Tigers got another chance to inch closer after Lee threw the ball away, and Sean Anthony's layup cut the lead to just one with around a minute remaining.
Jervy Cruz split his free throws with 32 seconds left to give RoS a 96-94 lead, and the E-Painters appeared to have a lock on the game after JV Casio missed on a drive. But Jeff Chan couldn't put the game away. Like Belga and Cruz, he also split his free throws to keep the Tigers' hopes alive.
Everyone in the building knew who would attempt the triple that would tie the game, including Lee, who stripped David of the ball as the latter was elevating for a three-point shot. But Lee also caught David's forearm, awarding David with three free throws with only 10 seconds left.
Game on the line, three charity shots to be taken. Nervous much, Gary?
"Pakiramdam ko, kaya ko ito," he said. "Nag sho-shooting ako araw-araw sa practice, free throws. Bago umuwi, ilang free throw ang ginagawa ko. Basta tira lang ako. Basta ki-kiss lang ako sa tattoo, okay na."
He was talking about the tattoo on his right arm bearing the names of his two children, who serve as his inspiration when he's playing. David calmly sank all three free throws, but Rain or Shine still had a chance to win it after Lee set up Belga for an open triple. The shot was a little too long and hit the top of the backboard, resulting in a violation.
There was still 0.6 of a second left for Powerade to come up with a miracle shot, and while the crowd (and perhaps the E-Painters as well) were expecting David to deliver the game-winner, something else was being discussed in the Tigers' huddle.
"Actually si Gary ang nag-suggest ng play," Perasol revealed. "Hindi iyon ang play namin. Sabi niya, 'Coach, inaabangan ako dito. Ipa-pick mo si Doug (Kramer) dito, mag-open na lang siya.' Si Doug din ang nagsabi kay Marcio (Lassiter, who would be inbounding), 'Marcio, ma-oopen ako rito.'"
The play was executed perfectly, Kramer setting a screen at the top of the key before sliding towards the basket unmarked. He caught Lassiter's pass and quickly turned to shoot a five-footer, but in his haste the shot missed. Overtime.
After Kramer's miss, Perasol saw something that told him they would win it in overtime. "They were enjoying themselves. Sabi nila, 'Sayang, we could have won it!' I was looking at them. Nakangiti silang lahat. Walang nakayuko sa kanila."
In the overtime period, Rain or Shine simply collapsed in a maze of turnovers. Gabe Norwood scored a minute into extra time to give RoS a 99-97 lead, but the E-Painters wouldn't score again. Fittingly, David delivered the game-clincher, a fastbreak basket that gave the Tigers a 103-99 with only 31 seconds left.
Despite basically handing the game over to the Tigers on a silver platter with all those missed free throws in the last two minutes, RoS coach Yeng Guiao didn't sound too disappointed.
"It was a nice game," the normally fiery coach said. "It was a well-played game except that we just missed too many three-point shots, most especially when they were zoning us."
The E-Painters shot a dismal 3-for-28 from three-point distance, yet Guiao pointed out they still had a good chance to win. "We could have won it, but Beau missed, Jeff missed a free throw. We're not too disappointed we lost. We played a close game despite the fact that we were missing our three-point shots.
"It's a series, its just 2-1. We'll come back Tuesday. We'll just go back to the gym and work on our three-point shooting. It was topsy-turvy in overtime. They played good defense, put a lot of pressure on our guards."
Perasol praised his team for hanging in there despite that six-point deficit.
"I have to give the credit to my players for not giving up. We were behind in the last two minutes, but they wanted to win the game."
Ironically, before David's heroics, Perasol was thinking of taking him out of the game.
"There was a time I was about to substitute Gary for a defensive man, but I just told him, 'Gary, ikaw na lang' because [I felt] he was the one who was going to win the game for us. And he did it for us for the nth time. But this is not over. The only thing we did here is get a one-game advantage over Rain or Shine."
David's feat of five straight playoff games with at least 30 points is, according to league historians, something that might have never been done before by a local player. It's close to impossible to know for sure, since statistics of the PBA's early, high-scoring years are hard to come by, although Danny Florencio actually averaged 31 points a game for the entire 1977 season. Take note, though, that we're referring to playoff games here, so if Florencio did string together more consecutive 30-plus games, it most likely involved elimination-round games.
But whatever the case, it's quite safe to say no one over the last 20 years has done this. And for David to do it in an era when scoring has actually gone down compared to 25, 30 years ago is truly remarkable.
E-mail: sid_ventura@yahoo.com.
