The gangling former La Salle stalwart Wednesday night pulled down a night-high 14 rebounds and swatted away five enemy attempts – three of them in the fourth period alone – to lead the Llamados to a 75-71 victory over Meralco, the defending champions’ first in the PBA Philippine Cup.
Maierhofer also scored nine points, the last two coming with 2:15 left which gave the Llamados a 72-67 cushion that proved enough for Derby Ace to win for the first time in four games and deal their former coach a third straight loss.
Ryan Gregorio’s Meralco crew actually dropped in the company of the Llamados at 1-3 as the Bolts repeatedly found a hindrance in the paint in Maierhofer, the second pick overall in last season’s Draft behind Japeth Aguilar.
Meralco couldn’t capitalize on the 24-point output of Mac Cardona, who chalked up his conference high despite shooting less than 30% from the floor. Gabby Espinas completed a double-double for Gregorio with 12 points and 10 boards.
Reigning MVP James Yap paced the Llamados with 13 points despite going 1-of-6 from three-point range and 2-of-10 from the field.
Jerwin Gaco, an unrestricted free agent pick up for the Llamados, had 10 points while Jondan Salvador, another one of coach Jorge Gallent’s undersized big men, had nine points and 10 rebounds as Derby Ace won the battle off the boards, 56-47.
“We had a good effort off the boards,” Gallent, the amateur champion coach, said after picking up his first professional win. “We knew that we have to finish games well. That’s what we haven’t done in our past games.” The game was tied for the last time at 60 early in the fourth period before the Llamados dropped a 12-2 bomb to ease out front.
But the Bolts didn’t simply roll over and die as Cardona scored half of his squad’s 14 fourth quarter points to keep Meralco in the game.
Cardona, though, had two crucial miscues in the endgame, the first a passing error that led to two Jonas Villanueva free throws which made it 74-67.
Derby Ace continued to be without Rafi Reavis, Marc Pingris and Kerby Raymundo, a perennial Mythical Team member who is expected to be out until March. Pingris and Reavis could make it back to the lineup as early as December.
And while Derby Ace broke through, Talk ‘N Text suffered a first defeat earlier in the night after Solomon Mercado drained the game-winning jumper with 1.5 seconds left to lift Rain or Shine to a 95-93 decision.
Rain or Shine won for just the second time in four outings, and this one came in the very same manner as the first, when Mercado popped a pass out to Jeff Chan for the game-clincher in an 89-86 victory over Air21 two weeks ago.
This time around, Mercado didn’t look for anyone to be the hero.
After Jimmy Alapag had tied the count at 93 with two free throws heading into the final 21.5 seconds, Mercado milked the clock and took the shot precisely not to give the Tropang Texters a chance to win it.
But the Texters still had 1.5 seconds on the clock, but Harvey Carey bungled an alley-oop pass to Kelly Williams, forcing Williams to take an off-balanced fade away that hit nothing but air.
Mercado top-scored for the Painters with 18, while Jay-R Reyes chipped in with 13 and six boards.
Former Rookie of the Year Gabriel Norwood had another fine all-around game with 11 markers, eight rebounds and six feeds.
Alapag scored 26 points for the Texters, while Carey fired 20 and pulled down 11 rebounds.
