Texters, Batang Pier eye to boost bid for quarters incentive

MANILA, Philippines – Talk n Text and Globalport try to jack up their stocks in the upper half of the chart as they face struggling opponents Barako Bull and San Mig Coffee, respectively, Friday in the PLDT MyDSL PBA Philippine Cup at the Mall of Asia Arena in Pasay City.

The Texters (4-2) and the Batang Pier (4-3) pursue their bids for a twice-to-beat incentive in the quarterfinals while the Energy Cola (2-5) and the Mixers (2-5) look to spark a chase of the leaders in a twinbill ushering a busy Yuletide schedule highlighted by the Christmas Day faceoff between Barangay Ginebra and Petron Blaze.

Talk n Text and Barako Bull clash at 5:45 p.m. then Globalport and San Mig Coffee collide at 8 p.m.

“We will try to build on our win versus Rain or Shine. The key will be our ability to defend their 3-point shooters especially Ronjay Buenafe,” said Talk n Text coach Norman Black.

Though two full games up on San Mig Coffee, Globalport coach Ritchie Ticzon still considers his team the underdog in their game.

“San Mig is a very talented team. Their record doesn’t reflect how good a team they are. We need to defend very well to be able to get an upset,” said Ticzon, facing an interesting side duel with his former coach at Alaska Milk.

But the Batang Pier seem to be really up for an uphill battle against the Mixers who have gone over the hump with a 90-88 win over the Energy Cola Tuesday.

San Mig Coffee coach Tim Cone said they would build on the positives of that tight two-point victory.

“The last game was the first time we had something positive for quite some time,” said Cone.

“It’s difficult time for us and all we can do is to keep working and working through it and find a way. Digging deep, playing hard and battling until we get something positive going,” Cone also said.

“It’s been difficult for us, and we have to weather ourselves through it,” added Cone, in his worst conference start in a tourney since moving over from Alaska Milk.

Obviously soaring higher at the moment are the Batang Pier with their mini-breakthrough of three straight victories.

They’re among the frontrunners right now after successive wins over Meralco, Rain or Shine and Alaska Milk. Before that, they’d never won back-to-back games in their young franchise history.

With their mix of grizzled warriors and promising young talents continuing to do well together, the Batang Pier blew by the Aces, 94-84, thus finishing above .500 mark in the first half of the elims.

“Basically, we’re able to play good defense to set the tone in the first half, and we’re able to sustain the effort throughout,” said Globalport coach Ritchie Ticzon of their dominant performance over the Aces.

Sol Mercado, Jay Washington, Mark Yee, Terrence Romeo and RR Garcia, fast emerging as Globalport’s deadly five, complemented well one another as Globalport stayed on the run and right behind leaders Petron, Barangay Ginebra, Talk n Text and Rain or Shine.