Behind their Mutt and Jeff combination of June Mar Fajardo and CJ Perez, San Miguel Beermen took a 2-1 lead in their 2022 PBA Philippine Cup semifinal series against Meralco Bolts with a 96-91 win on Sunday.
With Fajardo and Perez combining for nearly half of the Beermen's points as they held off repeated rallies from the Bolts to regain the lead in the best-of-seven series, we look at the main takeaways from Sunday's Game 3.
June Mar bucks slow start
Fajardo had just six points at halftime after taking only three shots, thanks to Meralco's swarming defense that forced him to give up the ball often.
The good news for the Beermen was that other players like Perez and Mo Tautuaa picked up the slack and staked them to a 46-42 halftime lead.
In the second half, Fajardo was more assertive, putting up 15 points to finish with 21 to go along with 16 boards.
"Their main problem is post play, and I was able to utilize Mo (Tautuaa) because they were trying to defend June Mar," SMB coach Leo Austria said.
"He only scored six points (in the first half) because of the defense, but it gave an opening for his teammate. And that's a sign of maturity.
"We talked about that, about the post because he cannot win against three guys because they know what to do. Luckily, what happened in the second game, when they kept on grabbing him, didn't happen this time and the referees called fouls."
"Credit to Meralco. They played good defense on me," Fajardo said in Tagalog. "It's good my teammates picked up the slack. In the second half I got the ball more, I got offensive rebounds. So I was able to score. Pops (Austria) tells me to be a decoy first, so that's what I do. When the defense on me loosens, my teammates give me the ball back."
The Bolts threw multiple bodies at Fajardo and even got physical at times, but he found a way to deal with it.
"It's okay. I expect it," Fajardo added. " I prepare my body for the physicality. I just need to focus on the game. I don't need to complain to the refs. It's their job whether to call or something or not."
Bolts just couldn't get over the hump
This was one of those games where one team appeared to be in control from start to finish, but the score was never one-sided.
The Beermen led for majority of the game, but their largest lead was only 10 points. The Bolts never fell behind by much, but just couldn't draw level in the second half.
Austria credits his players for being step ahead, saying: First of all, it was very hard to do that against Meralco because they are well-prepared. They know what to do at the post, and they know what to do on the pick and roll.
"They don't want to be left behind by more than five or ten. Luckily, we got a double-digit (lead), but it was only for a brief time. They kept on coming back. The difference is we were able to anticipate what kind of defense they're applying to June Mar.
"I think the team knows how to win crucial games, but we were just lucky because Meralco is really a tough team to beat up to the last minute. You cannot blink against Meralco because they are well-prepared."
What kept the Bolts in the game was their offensive rebounding. They grabbed 19, which led to 22 second-chance points.
"We have to polish our defense because they still manage to score a lot," Austria admitted. "Hopefully they don't get easy shots anymore and they got a lot of offensive rebounds. And I told the team we shouldn't run our fastbreak for now because some of the players want to leak out right away. I told them we have to secure the rebound first.
"In a series against Coach Norman (Black) and Meralco, this is a game of adjustments. We will try our best to anticipate what kind of adjustments they will make next game."
Where CJ goes, so goes SMB
If there's one player who serves as a bellwether for the Beermen's fortunes in this series, it's probably CJ Perez.
In SMB's two wins, the talented guard averaged 25.5 points on 47.3% field goal shooting.
In their lone loss, he was held to just 14 on 5-of-17 from the field. In Game 3, he led the Beermen with 26, the highest single-game output by any player from either team in the series so far.
The better news for Austria is that Perez had no turnovers in Game 3 after tallying nine in the first two games.
"We know CJ, any given time, whenever he's on the court he wants to score, he wants to run," Austria noted. "That's the thing we're trying to control. Forced shots.
"When he makes a mistake, I take him out just to remind him. But definitely we can't let him stay on the bench too long because he's always a threat.
"At the same time he's the one controlling (Chris) Newsome. They respect each other, and that's the reason why most of the time they're matched up."
Newsome led the Bolts with 16 points, but shot just 6-of-18.