Tanduay presses playoff bid versus Alaska tonight

With Tanduay team owner Bong Tan’s latest spat with the Commissioner’s Office over, the Rhum Masters can now concentrate fully only on playing ball.

And this is bad news for the Alaska Aces.

Tanduay seeks to force a playoff for the last berth in the PBA All-Filipino Cup quarterfinals as the Rhum Masters take on the Aces in their last game in the elimination round today at the Araneta Coliseum.

Mobiline and San Miguel Beer collide in the other game with the Phone Pals hoping to avoid a danger of figuring in a playoff and the Beermen looking for a win that could provide them the needed momentum going into the quarterfinals.

However, all eyes will be on the Rhum Masters as they fight for dear life in the tourney which has claimed one casualty in the Sta. Lucia Realtors.

If Tanduay hurdles Alaska, the Rhum Masters will even get a chance at an outright entry into the quarterfinals in case both the Phone Pals and the Barangay Ginebra Kings or either of the two lose their last game in the elims.

Among the possible scenarios at the close of the eliminations Wednesday are a three-way tie for seventh place and a four-way tie for sixth. In these cases, the two teams with the inferior quotients knock each other out for the last quarters berth.

Tanduay, which pulled off a big reversal of San Miguel the last time out, looks poised to making it two in a row versus Alaska.

The Aces dug a hole for themselves when they dropped a sorry loss to the Pop Cola Panthers last Sunday. Alaska could have gained a shot at the Magic Four had it beat Pop Cola.