Rain or Shine last night worked so hard that Petron Blaze just lost its myth of invincibility.

Trailing most of the night, the Elasto Painters let it all hang loose in the fourth period before hammering out a 99-95 overtime win over the Boosters in the PBA Philippine Cup eliminations at the Mall of Asia Arena in Pasay.

Paul Lee hit the Painters’ final five points, doing the hatchet job after Jervy Cruz gave them the chance to steal the game as Rain or Shine rose to 5-3 and got back in the thick of the race for a top two finish.

The loss was the first in eight games for the Boosters, whose decided advantage in size in paper didn’t matter for the first time this season as they lost the battle for the rebounds, 66-61, even with the 6-foot-9 June Mar Fajardo and reigning MVP Arwind Santos grabbing 16 boards each.

“We just had to grind it out,” Rain or Shine coach Yeng Guiao told scribes before taking a jab at officiating once again. “We played a bad first half but made up for it in the second half. We couldn’t get breaks from the refs so we had to create our own breaks.” Guiao pointed to a disconcerting call on Ryan Arana with 14.3 seconds remaining, which nullified a Chris Lutz miss from the line and allowed the Petron guard to knot the game at 87 to eventually forge overtime.

Before that, Guiao also cited a non-call on a driving Gabe Norwood, who threw up an airball from 10 feet. Guiao said it was clear that Norwood was touched in the elbow.

Still, Guiao did not take anything away from the Boosters.

“Petron is such a good team that you need extraordinary effort to beat them,” added Guiao. “I think we worked a little harder today than we did in the last game. We lost by 17 rebounds to Talk ‘N Text and we promised ourselves not to do so again.” Cruz also scored five straight points and Norwood had an assist to both Cruz and Lee, with the last one – a cross court pass to a wide open Lee on the left corner – resulting in a triple that put the game away, 97-93, with 36.2 left.

“We were getting frustrated with the calls, but we just refocused on winning the game and absorbing those bad breaks,” Guiao said.

Fajardo was of no help to the Petron cause for most of the extension, fouling out with still 4:01 remaining after tagging a driving Norwood, who made a free throw for 90-87.

Cruz was then credited for the next Rain or Shine basket when Santos and Lutz fought for the rebound and accidentally tapped the ball into the hoop for a five-point Rain or Shine lead with 3:22 to go.

Making up for that, Lutz first hit a short jumper and then a layup while drawing a foul from Lee only to miss the bonus free throw which would have tied things all up again at 92.

Norwood then spotted Cruz underneath for 94-91 before Lee finished off the Boosters with that triple and two free throws off Marcio Lassiter in the final 8.8 seconds for the final count.

The Petron loss now means that the Boosters will clash with sister team Barangay Ginebra for the solo lead on Christmas Day after the Gin Kings – who also blew a 16-point first half lead – were able to regroup in the second half to turn back Alaska, 96-89.

LA Tenorio, healthy again after a two-week bout with a mysterious virus, turned in MVP-like numbers of 24 points, eight rebounds and six assists and Japeth Aguilar had 21 and Greg Slaughter 18 for the Kings, who are now tied with the Boosters at 7-1.

Alaska, which erased a 23-7 deficit to go ahead, 50-42 at the half, again failed to win a second straight game and dropped to 3-6, way out of the upper half of the draw most experts predicted the Aces would be at this stage in the tournament.

Jayvee Casio paced the Aces with 27 points, whole Sonny Thoss fired 22, more than holding his own against the Aguilar-Slaughter combination underneath.