Alab Pilipinas absorb 21-point beatdown vs Slingers

MANILA, Philippines — Alab Pilipinas could not overcome the Singapore Singers, suffering a 64-85 rout in their match Sunday at the OCBC Arena in Singapore.

Playing in hostile territory, the Filipino cagers struggled to make anything happen on offense and fell to a 5-3 ASEAN Basketball League record.

It was all the Slingers from the get-go with Xavier Alexander imposing his will on Alab.

At the half, the Philippine ballers were trailing by nine, 33-42.

But a messy third salvo that saw Alab struggling to find the bottom of the basket and turning the ball over put the game virtually out of reach.

Only scoring 11 points the whole third quarter, Alab was suddenly in a 22-point hole, 44-66 with a quarter of play to go.

Alexander led the Slingers with 31 points in the game on 9-of-16 shooting.

Anthony McClain and Marcus Elliot also finished the night in double digits with 18 and 19 points, respectively.

Meanwhile, only Samuel Deguara scored more than 10 for Alab, tallying a total of 14 points off the bench.

Alab will go on an 11-day hiatus before they face Hong Kong Eastern on January 23.