Red Bull five takes nasty fall

Lamont Strothers hurt his right hand on a bad fall in the second quarter but returned to fuel San Miguel Beer’s charge en route to an 89-67 rout of Red Bull in their Samsung PBA Governors Cup road game at the La Salle Sentrum here last night.

Strothers recovered from the fall and came back to score 12 of their 20 points in the third quarter and the Beermen broke away to carve out one of the most lopsided victories thus far this season.

Taking a third win in their last four outings, the Beermen, the losing finalists in this tourney last year, enhanced their quarterfinal bid as they improved to eighth place with a 3-5 win-loss card.

Red Bull failed in its attempt to nail a second three-game skein in the tournament, sliding to third place in a tie with idle Coca-Cola at 5-2. Purefoods remained alone in the lead at 6-1 with Talk N Text at second at 4-1.

Before Strothers caught fire in the third quarter to spark the San Miguel breakaway, it was a nip-and-tuck battle with the first quarter ending at 19-all and the count standing at 35-all entering the last two minutes of the first half.

But the close game turned into a ghastly rout as Strothers returned after the bad fall and blazed away in the third quarter. Strothers led all scorers with 25 points that went with four rebounds and five assists.

Trailing by 30 points at the start of the last period, Red Bull coach Yeng Guioa threw in the towel by taking out imports Julius Nwosu and Joe Bunn and allowing this reserve crew to finish the game.

Strothers and Mario Bennett scored 46 points together as against the 24 of Bunn and Nwosu.

San Miguel was protecting a slim 25-21 lead when Strothers suffered the injury.

Meanwhile, Barangay Ginebra brings back Brian Green in place of Des Ferguson when it plays Airfreight 2100/FedEx at 3:45 p.m. today, hoping to find the right combination of imports that could save the team from early ouster in the tournament.

Talk N Text clashes with RP Selecta in the other half of the Saturday twinbill at the Ynares Sports center in Antipolo.

The Kings, who have played three imports so far, are on the brink of elimination with a 1-5 record.