MANILA, Philippines — Wesports KL Dragons pounced on the second half collapse of the Air-Asia-Philippine Patriots to score a 92-74 rout and hand the Filipinos their second home defeat in the AirAsia ASEAN Basketball League Sunday night at the Yñares Sports Arena in Pasig City.
The Patriots, looking poised to bounce back from a stinging loss to the Chang Thailand Slammers last week, zoomed to a seven-point halftime lead and gained a 52-42 edge on a three-pointer by Chito Jaime at the start of the third period.
Then, disaster struck the Filipinos.
With the Filipinos struggling to make their shots, the Dragons made their move and clawed their way back with 16 unanswered points before pulling away to score the win that put the Filipinos in danger of missing the No. 2 spot and a homecourt edge in the semifinals.
The loss dropped the Patriots in a tie with the Malaysians for the second spot with identical 8-6 slates heading into the final week of the regular season.
Pumping in nine crucial points, import Justin Leith starred in that Dragons’ blazing 16-0 wind up that gave the 58-52 lead and the momentum to soar to 20-point leads in the dying seconds.
“That’s the story of the game,” Patriots coach Louie Alas said. “We led by 10 points at the start of the third and it all went downhill from there. We played soft on both ends and we struggled against their zone defense.”
It was the worst home defeat for the Patriots, who is 16-2 on local soil since the league was launched in 2009.
They earlier suffered a 69-68 loss to Thailand on Nov. 20 in the team’s first-ever home defeat.
”We put a 2-3 zone defense to capitalize on their (Patriots) difficulty shooting from the outside,” said KL Dragons mentor Goh Cheng Huat, whose squad won the season series, 2-1, and owns tiebreaker should both teams end up tied after the elims.
The muscular Leith finished with 29 points on 11-of-18 shooting that was spiked by four triples for the visitors.
The Patriots muffed 28-of-37 shots in the second half and held PH imports Gabe Freeman and Steve Thomas scoreless.
Egay Billones had 23 points and three assists to lead the Patriots while Warren Ybañez had his most productive game of the season with 12 points, five rebounds, two assists and two steals.
Freeman had 12 points and 10 boards although he shot 4-of-17 from the field while Thomas made nine points and 19 boards.
The scores:
KL DRAGONS 92 — Leith 29, Miller 18, Lingganay 16, Cabahug 13, Batumalai 8, Raymundo 6, Jing 2, Seng 0, Loh 0.
PH PATRIOTS 74 — Billones 23, Freeman 12, Ybanez 12, Thomas 9, Fernandez 8, Cabatu 5, Jaime 3, Crisano 2, Alcaraz 0, Salangsang 0, Sta Maria 0.
Quarters: 30-25; 42-49; 73-63; 92-74.
Jonas Terrado, Manila Bulletin
