Never-say-die Shell ousts Sta. Lucia

Shell suffered power shortage with the eary exit of import Ajani Williams but more than made up for that with sheer guts, completing a two-game upset of fourth seed Sta. Lucia Realty to reach the Gran Matador PBA Fiesta Conference quarterfinals at the Araneta Coliseum last night.

Losing Williams with 3:17 left to play, the Turbochargers dragged the Realtors in a fierce defensive battle at endgame and squeezed out an 87-85 win that gave them the third seat in the quarterfinals which start Wednesday in the same venue.

"The team really wanted to enter the next round and they showed a big heart in achieving it," said Shell coach Leo Austria.

"They didn’t get frustrated as we lost Williams because they knew it takes five players to win the game. Ipinakita nila hindi lang import ang magpapanalo sa amin," Austria added.

The Turbochargers went scoreless in the final 1:30 but kept their tough defensive stance to win the sudden-death match and become only the seventh team in league history to survive a twice-to-win task.

"Inisip lang namin it’s just like a best-of-three series. Kailangan mo rin ng dalawang panalo to make it to the next round," said Austria.

Two missed free throws by Tony dela Cruz with 7.5 ticks left actually gave the Realtors a chance to send the game into overtime.

But Dela Cruz himself put up a good defense in delaying Boyet Fernandez from bringing down the ball. The Realtors saw their quarters hope vanish into thin air with Ryan Fletcher wildly missing the target as his wild court-to-court pass went out of bounds in the dying seconds.

It was the second time in nearly three years that Sta. Lucia blew away a twice-to-win advantage in post classification round plays.

The Realtors ran into a maze of errors at endgame with ace players Kenneth Duremdes and Dennis Espino being called an offensive foul each. Duremdes also had a passing miscue, and the team committed a total of 24 turnovers in the game.

Chris Calaguio held his ground against Duremdes in the second half, making four three-pointers, including one with time down to 1:30 that gave Shell an 87-83 cushion.

After three straight errors, Sta. Lucia finally narrowed the gap to two with only 11 seconds to go as Duremdes scored on a putback following a missed three-point attempt by Paeng Santos.

Then it took the Realtors three fouls to finally send Dela Cruz at the stripe.

Probably because of tremendous pressure, Dela Cruz muffed both charities, opening an overtime play opportunity for the Realtors.

Alas, Sta. Lucia coach Alfrancis Chua had run out of timeout, and the Realtors couldn’t even take a decent attempt at the basket.