MANILA, 19 March 2004 — The Alaska Aces, drawing premium performances from import Galen Young and locals Ali Peek, Mike Cortez and Brandon Cablay, cruised to an easy 105-80 victory over FedEx Express in the Gran Matador Philippine Basketball Association Fiesta Conference at the Araneta Coliseum.
Young had a triple double to help the Aces to a 4-1 start.
Young finished with 27 points, 12 rebounds and 12 assists to lead the Aces.
FedEx dropped its fourth straight game in as many starts.
The Aces’ talent was just too much that the Express never had the chance to deliver.
Except for the first six minutes of the game when the Express went on top briefly, 12-10, the Aces were never really in trouble.
All it took them were the last six minutes of the opening quarter to put things in order, 30-18.
In the second game, former MVP Willie Miller made his first big impact for new team Talk ‘N’ Text, scoring five points in the final 24 seconds to carry the Phone Pals to a 94-92 win over hard-luck Sta. Lucia.
Miller, acquired from Red Bull in the off-season, hit a pull-up three-pointer on a fastbreak to knot the count at 92-all with 23 seconds left then grabbed the loose ball after a Sta. Lucia miss and managed to call a timeout, setting up his buzzer-beating heroics.
With 1.9 seconds left in the clock, the 5-10 guard took the inbounds pass from a step inside the three-point arc, faked off Sta. Lucia import Derrick Brown, dribbled once then let fly a jumper that rattled into the hoop as the horn sounded. An instant replay review confirmed what by then a dejected SLR coach Al Chua had already known — Miller’s shot came just in the nick of time to give the Phone Pals their fourth win in five games, and the Realtors a fifth successive loss.
Miller finished with just 14 points, third in the scoring ladder behind Randy Holcomb’s 26 and the 16 punched in by Asi Taulava. But his last five points’ including the triple that tied the game at 92 with 23 seconds remaining - were the ones that mattered most.
Meanwhile, five years after he took over from Rino Salazar and coached his first game with Barangay Ginebra - an 82-76 loss to Tanduay in the 1999 Governors Cup that kicked off a 0-7 start - Allan Caidic, one of the PBA’s 25 Greatest Players and arguably Philippine basketball’s deadliest sharpshooter, lost his grip on the reins of the country’s most popular ball club.
