USUALLY, the only time you’ll see San Miguel on the court at 10 a.m. is during practice at the team’s headquarters in Acropolis Gym.
But due to these tough times of the pandemic, the Beermen had to play an official PBA game late in the morning as the Philippine Cup inside the Smart Giga Clark City bubble resumed on Tuesday.
The PBA was forced to rejig its game schedules after matches were postponed due to a Covid-19 ‘probable case’ reported inside the bubble. That led to quadruple headers being slated from Tuesday until November 11, the conclusion of the elimination round.
The first team that won in the quadruple header, a first in league history, is the Beermen, who beat Blackwater, 90-88, in overtime to extend their winning streak to four games.
San Miguel coach Leo Austria admitted all of them needed to adjust to the early start of their game. Austria added the players also had to adjust to the length of their sleep for the match, some of them waking up as early as 6 a.m.
“Since yesterday, we were able to start adjusting,” said Austria. “This is an unusual schedule for anybody, especially for a team playing at 10 o’clock. What I want them to have is your mindset should be on the game because whatever kind of adjustment you want to have, especially the sleeping habit, you can’t do it because developed na ‘yung body clock natin eh.
“Some of the players, especially if there is a game, usually, they are sleeping at 11 to 12 (midnight) because they know that they can sleep up to lunch (time). But now, they can’t because they have to wake up at 6 o’clock to prepare.”
Arwind Santos played almost 40 minutes, while Chris Ross suited up for over 36 minutes off the bench.
At the end of the day, though, Austria said the order for the team is to focus on the game, and not on the morning schedule.
“But I told them your mindset is really important because it will tell you to do this and to do that. If you are thinking na it’s a hard schedule, most probably, it would be hard,” said Austria.
Austria said he is already preparing for the grueling schedule as the Beermen also have back-to-back games after the Wednesday rest day.
“As much as possible, we want to rotate a lot of players. But with the urgency, we need them to be inside. Talagang extended… What we are thinking is the game today, not tomorrow or in the future,” said Austria.
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