To the eyes of head coach Yeng Guiao, two of the three victories the Rain or Shine Elasto Painters won in a grind-it-out, come-from-behind fashion is an indication of continues character-building and maturity.
“Of course, you don’t want your team to always win like this. You want your team to win in a more comfortable fashion, but for me, this is a testament of the character this team has. It’s a character of a good team and through this, we’re also developing our maturity,” said Guiao in a telephone interview with Pinoystep.com on the heels of the Elasto Painters’ gripping 112-111 squeaker of Titan Ultra at the Ynares Center in Antipolo.
Rain or Shine pulled off a hard-earned victory capped by Anton Asistio’s four pressure-packed free throws.
Asistio drew a foul from Joshua Munzon in the final 2.1 seconds then sealed the win by making all four charity shots to complete the Elasto Painters’ triumph after battling back from a 19-point deficit in the third period.
Prior to Asistio knocking those game-winning free throws, Rain or Shine has been struggling shooting from the foul line as a team, but Guiao remained confident and kept his faith on his dead shot shooting guard.
“Shooter naman si Anton, kaya mataas ang kumpiyansa ko sa kanya,” added Guiao. “Mataas rin ang shooting percentage niya sa free throws kaya I was confident enough sa tsansa naming manalo. In fact, iniisip ko nga noon maski maka-tatlo lang OK na rin eh, pupunta kami sa overtime, but maybe because of the momentum of the team rallying from a big lead, that was a big factor, too.”
Asistio ranked it as probably one of the biggest games of his career, owing to the magnitude at how the Elasto Painters won.
“I’ve never been in this situation before,” added Asistio. “That’s why I ranked it up there as probably one of my biggest moments.”
Looking back, Asistio was having reservations of the team’s chances to win against Titan Ultra.
“We were really having a difficult time kasi halos hindi kami makalamang. Hahabol kami, makaka three-point shot sila, and then, magti-turnover kami, so parang I was having doubts about the chances of winning because of how things were going,” said Asistio.
“But I really have to give it to my teammates. Palaban kasi talaga sila. They won’t quit and probably because it rubbed off on us knowing yung coach namin, palaban rin kasi.”
