Meralco vs San Miguel

Rodney Brondial submitted his best game in a San Miguel uniform as he helped the Beermen maul Meralco.

They knocked to within just 14, but Perez and Brondial made sure that they won’t come any closer to secure the victory. The Fil-Italian guard went 5-of-5 from deep as he tried to spark the Bolts’ rally in the fourth quarter. The 6-foot-5 workhorse finished with a conference-high 20 markers and 11 boards as he played a big role in SMB’s early breakaway towards exacting vengeance on the Bolts to seize the 1-0 lead in the best-of-seven series.

As San Miguel Beermen got off to a winning start against Meralco Bolts in the PBA Philippine Cup semifinals, we delve deeper into Wednesday's 121-97 result.

"He keeps on running up and down getting the rebounds, and that's what he displayed tonight. "We were really worried at the start because of the way they played against Ginebra, which is a tough team to beat. "I'm sure the next time around they will adjust a lot of things. He's so focused on the game and I know he's a really hard worker. "They were focused on beating the other team. That's very evident in his game, and it's what I've seen him do since he was playing at the barangay level. "He wanted to play for me," Austria said jokingly when asked about their reunion. "We took advantage of that because we knew they were tired. Meralco shot just 45.3% from the field, compared to 57.9% for SMB. Rodney Brondial -- one of the new players acquired by SMB in recent months -- had a career-high 20 points to go along with 11 rebounds. "We all know Meralco has embarrassed us several times already. This includes two playoff series wins that still rankle the Beermen to this day.

San Miguel Beer essayed a dominant 121-97 against Meralco in Game 1 of their best-of-7 PBA Philippine Cup semis on Wednesday at the Araneta Coliseum.

It is very important to win the first game especially in a series," said Austria. Alam naman natin maraming beses kaming ipinahiya ng Meralco during the bubble. Then, in last conference, in the quarterfinals, na-eliminate nila kami," said Austria.

COMING off a hard-fought victory over Barangay Ginebra, the legs were obviously not there for the Meralco Bolts going to Game 1 of their PBA Philippine Cup ...

Nine games?,” said Trillo, adding how the Bolts played two OT games during that stretch against Magnolia and Ginebra. And the end result? This is like our fourth tonight and we didn’t come up with that intensity,” he stressed.

After taking the fast lane to the semis with a one-game drubbing of the Blackwater Bossing in the previous round, the Beermen zoomed to a 10-0 start to ...