THE Pampanga Giant Lanterns recovered from a sluggish start to thwart the Valenzuela Classic, 69-64, on Tuesday and stay within sight of the MPBL 2025 Season pacesetters at the Bren Z. Guiao Convention Center in San Fernando, Pampanga.
The reigning back-to-back champions trailed the Classics by as many as 8-22 and needed a nine-point run to tie the count before notching their 15th win in 20 starts in the round-robin elimination phase of the 30-team tournament.
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Pampanga trails fellow North Division teams Abra (18-1), Nueva Ecija (18-1) and San Juan (17-1), and South Division leader Quezon Province (15-3) in the chase for playoff spots.
Larry Muyang was the Giant Lanterns' best player with game-highs of 16 points and 14 rebounds, followed by Jhan Nermal with 9 points, 3 rebounds and 2 blocks, and John Ashley Faa with 7 points, 4 rebounds and 2 steals.
Pampanga top gun Archie Concepcion couldn't find his range, making only one of 12 field goal attempts, and settled for 4 points.
Valenzuela, which fell to 4-17, drew 15 points, 4 assists, 3 rebounds and 3 steals from Jan Formento, and 13 points plus 3 rebounds from Kobe Monje.
Earlier, Binan Tatak Gel led throughout in a 55-47 victory over Muntinlupa and climbed to 12-7.
Kristan Hernandez and Warren Bonifacio tallied 10 points and 7 rebounds each for Binan, which also drew 6 points and 6 rebounds from Jaymar Gimpayan.
Muntinlupa continued its slide and tumbled to 10-9 despite Miguel Ives Corteza's 16 points and Marvin Hayes' 11.
Sarangani subdued Davao Occidental, 66-54, in the opener to stay in contention.
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Powered by Danny Marilao, Kyt Jimenez and Junjie Lallare, the Sarangani Grippers improved to 8-12.
Marilao posted 15 points, 5 rebounds and 2 assists to earn Best Player honors over Jimenez, owner of the league's lone quadruple-double, with 11 points, 7 rebounds and 4 assists, and Hallare with 11 points, 7 rebounds, 3 assists and 2 steals.
Sarangani made only 5 of 12 free throws for a lowly 41.7 percent, but compensated by making 7 of 23 triple attempts against Davao's 3 of 25 tries.
The Davao Occidental Tigers suffered their third straight defeat and fell to 7-11 as only Jeff Comia submitted twin digits with 10.
The MPBL goes to the Cuneta Astrodome on Wednesday with games pitting Marikina against Gensan at 4 p.m., Paranaque against Zamboanga at 6 p.m., and host Pasay against Pasig at 8 p.m.
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