Harbour Centre guns for rare five-peat at PBL

TANAUAN CITY, Philippines - Harbour Centre guns for a rare five-peat Wednesday even as Hapee Toothpaste fights for survival in Game 4 of the PBL Lipovitan Amino Sports Cup, which returns to the Batangas City Sports Center for the resumption of the best-of-five title showdown. The Batang Pier won their last two games against the Complete Protectors, including a 90-78 victory on Tuesday in Tanauan City to take a 2-1 lead. And head coach Jorge Gallent, who has been in all of the team's four championship runs, wants nothing more than to win it all in front of an expected full crowd at the provincial capital starting at 4pm. "If we play the same kind of play we had in Game 3, then we will win the title," Gallent said in a postgame interview. Harbour got a strong effort from Most Valuable Player Jason Castro, along with role players Beau Belga and Jonathan Fernandez, to come away with the win. Castro has been the main cog for the Batang Pier thus far in the series, averaging 19 points, 5.3 rebounds, four assists, and 2.7 steals while hitting 49 percent from the floor in the finals. But Hapee head coach Louie Alas plans to make improvements from two disappointing losses in order to extend the series to a pivotal fifth game, also in Batangas City on Saturday. "Medyo adjust lang kami sa mga X's and O's namin dahil last two games naiiwanan kami ng Harbour sa third quarter (We just have to adjust our X's and O's, because Harbour left us behind in the third quarter of the last two games}," Alas said before heading to team practice. The Complete Protectors has had solid support from Larry Rodriguez, as he posted a double-double average of 13.3 points and 12.7 rebounds through three games, along with help from Instant Impact award winner Reed Juntilla, who tallied 11.7 points in the series. But Hapee has saw disappointing numbers from Rodriguez's fellow Mythical Five member Mark Borboran, who is putting up just 7.0 points and 6.7 rebounds while shooting just 7-for-32 from the field. Even Gabe Norwood, their prized Fil-Am star who lost to Castro in the MVP race, is shooting just 39 percent despite a 12-point, 6.3-rebound, and 4.7-assist numbers. On the other hand, the role players of the Batang Pier has been contributing sparingly, with Edwin Asoro putting up solid numbers of 8.0 points and 3.7 rebounds in 14 minutes of play, while Fernandez and Jeff Chan combined for 21 points and 14 made triples. This will be the second time that the league will book a match in Batangas City, following Hapee's come-from-behind 74-73 win in Game 1 with a record crowd of 6,000 fans last week to jumpstart the title series. - JONAS TERRADO, GMANews.TV