Petron Blaze Boosters vs BMEG LLamados

Sunday Salvacion and Arwind Santos delivered big plays in the crunch and Petron Blaze withstood B-Meg’s gutsy challenge, squeezing out a 97-92 win that kept the Boosters in contention for the PBA Governors Cup finals at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.

Salvacion fired a crucial trey then Santos foiled a drive by James Yap and later drilled in a free throw and made a short stab as the Boosters salvaged the game and stayed alive with a 7-5 win-loss card heading to the final play date of the semifinals.

The Llamados went all out in a bid to end their season on a winning note, but still came up short, closing out the conference with a 5-8 card.

They wound up with a 20-24 record in the season, the team’s all-time biggest slide from the previous season after collecting 41 wins against 23 losses in the 2009-2010 campaign.

Petron coach Ato Agustin could only heave a big sigh of relief after the contest.

“I just couldn’t understand. It looked like B-Meg wanted it more,” rued Agustin as they barely hurdled the long ousted Llamados.

The two teams engaged in a fierce battle, fighting through 22 lead changes and seven deadlocks before Petron surged ahead to stay at 89-88 on a triple by Salvacion with 1:37 left to play.

The Boosters made it a four-point game, 94-90, as Danny Ildefonso canned in two charities after Santos blocked a drive by Yap.

Santos himself settled the outcome of the game with a free throw, preserving import Anthony Grundy’s near triple-double job with 29 points, 11 assists and nine rebounds.

Petron played minus injured players Alex Cabagnot and Joseph Yeo then lost Rabeh Al-Hussaini after sustaining a suspected ACL tear late in the first half.

“We have health problems but we’ll be there fighting to the very end,” said Agustin.

The Boosters must beat the Talk n Text side in the final game of the semis tomorrow to get a shot at the second finals berth.

Grundy scored 11 points on 4-of-7 field-goal shooting to cushion the impact of B-Meg’s second-quarter surge, keeping Petron Blaze in the lead, 46-41, at the half.

Al-Hussaini put in four points and three rebounds coming off the bench in the second canto but didn’t last long on the court as he hurt his right knee in a freak accident.

The Boosters took the opening quarter at 23-15 before reeling a bit as the Llamados dragged them into nine lead changes in the second period.

Yap was perfect from the field, going 2-of-2 from the three-point area and 2-of-2 from the two-point zone to lead the Llamados’ second-quarter charge.

The two teams figured in a fierce shootout in the second period with the Llamados converting 73.3 percent of their shots and the Boosters hitting at a 50-percent clip.

Joshua Urbiztondo stole off Jojo Duncil and banged in a three-pointer as the Llamados had their first taste of the lead at 27-25.

Don Allado followed it up with a perimeter jumper as B-Meg stretched its lead to 29-25 before Petron regrouped and regained control with a five-point at the half. – Nelson Beltran

Boxscore:

Petron 97 – Grundy 29, Santos 22, Salvacion 14, Ildefonso 14, Miranda 12, Al-Hussaini 4, Baclao 2, Duncil 0, Hubalde 0, Pennisi 0.

B-Meg 92 – Yap J. 23, Devance 18, Pingris 16, Allen 15, Urbiztondo 10, Allado 8, Reavis 2, Gaco 0, Fernandez 0, Adducul 0.

Quarterscores: 23-15, 46-41, 65-66, 97-92