Perlas hard-pressed to sweep remaining SEAG assignments

KUALA LUMPUR – Perlas Pilipinas coach Patrick Aquino is keeping a positive posture, saying all is not lost on their 68-78 setback against Indonesia Monday night in the SEAG women’s basketball competition at the MABA Stadium.

He said they would try to win all their remaining games and hope for favorable results from the games of their top rivals Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia.

“They’ve yet to play one another. Thailand and Malaysia are also tough. If Indonesia loses to both the Thais and the hosts, then we’ll be back in contention (for the gold),” said Aquino.

 “Of course, we have to beat Thailand and Malaysia, and the rest of our games,” he added.

Fourteen hours after their loss to Indons, the Filipinas vented their ire on the hapless Myanmar squad, 123-33.

And they now go through a tough grind of facing Thailand and Malaysia in back-to-back games. They play the Thais at 8:15 p.m. tonight then the Malaysians at 11:15 a.m. tomorrow.

Indonesia (2-0) and Malaysia (2-0) fight for the solo lead in the main setto Tuesday.

Earlier, Thailand crushed Singapore, 70-42, for a second straight win.

The Philippine-Myanmar match was a virtual no-contest.

Starters Afril Bernardino, Allana Lim, Analyn Almazan, Marizze Andrea Tongco and Janine Pontejos set the tone of the match right at the get-go, racing to a 33-8 first quarter lead.

Center Claire Castro collected a double-double with 21 points and 12 rebounds, Almazan had her near double-double effort with 14 boards and eight markers while Cindy Resultay and Raisa Dy contributed 16 points apiece as Perlas scored the most lopsided win in the tourney thus far.

So dominant were the Filipinas that they allowed only five Myanmar players to get into the scoring column.

The Burmese produced merely 33 points on a 14-of-73 clip.

The scores:

Philippines 123 –Castro 21, Dy 16, Resultay 16, Bernardino 15, Pontejos 12, Animan 10, Lim 9, Almazan 8, Sambile 6, Tongoc 4, Abaca 4, Cabinbin 2.

Myanmar 33 – Htwe 8, Yu 8, Aung 7, Soe 6, Lin 4, Moe 0, Zin 0, Aung 0.

Quarterscores: 33-8, 64-14, 86-19, 123-33