Alaska reserves blast Beermen

ANTIPOLO — Alaska drew big games from its reserved crew to fashion out an impressive 95-77 rout of San Miguel Beer last night and zero in on an outright quarterfinal berth in the Gran Matador-PBA Philippine Cup at the Ynares Center here.

The Aces rode on Reynel Hugnatan and Willie Miller’s explosions in a crucial run early in the fourth period which the team used as springboard to pull away from a close contest and into their second straight victory for an 8-7 (win-loss) overall card.

"San Miguel played hard. They still have the desire to win even if they’re already in the semis," said Alaska coach Tim Cone. "But good thing, the bench players stepped up when it mattered most."

Hugnatan came off the bench to fire a team-high 16 points. He also grabbed 12 rebounds, seven of them on the offensive end, while Nic Belasco tossed in 15 points and pulled down seven rebounds.

Eddie Laure, tapped by the team only at the start of this All-Filipino conference, finished with only six points, but sparked a 20-7 run with 9:53 to go in the final period that put the Aces way ahead, 70-57.

The game was tied at 50 when Alaska came through with that decisive run which San Miguel failed to stop.

Alaska now needs to win its remaining assignment opposite Barangay Ginebra to earn an outright passage in the quarterfinal phase.

The Beermen, the first team to make the semis, lost for only the fourth time in 15 games, enabling idle Purefoods Giants to gain a share of the lead.

Danny Seigle paced San Miguel with 21 points in 23 minutes of action while Dorian Peña had another double-double with 15 and 12 rebounds.

Coach Jong Uichico used the game to give the Beermen’s reserves some playing minutes.

Meanwhile, Barangay Ginebra plays Air21 in Mandaue City today without leading scorer Mark Caguioa, who was suspended for one game after he was ejected in the Kings’ game against the Coca-Cola Tigers the other day.

The prolific Ginebra guard was thrown out of the game for incurring his second technical foul shortly after he threw the ball on the stand with 7:44 left in the third period and the Kings trailing by 18.

On top of the suspension, Caguioa was also slapped a P5,000 fine.

This is the second time in a month’s span that the 6-foot-1 Fil-Am was fined by the league. He was earlier penalized for P80,000 after failing to show up in the 2006 All-Star weekend in Cagayan de Oro.

The 6-7 Gins are trying to earn at least an outright berth in the quarterfinals.