BAY Area Dragons survived a furious fourth-quarter surge by Converge, 106-100, to keep their unbeaten run going in the PBA Commissioner's Cup on Friday night at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
The Dragons saw their huge 22-point lead chopped to just four points inside the final two minutes, but missed and hurried shots by the FiberXers kept them from completing the comeback.
Two free throws by import Myles Powell with 11 seconds left clinched the Dragons' fourth straight win, which enabled the foreign guest team to regain the solo top spot in the season-ending conference.
Dragons coach Brian Goorjian credited Converge for giving his team a big scare coming home.
"The last four minutes of the game, they put pressure on us, and we really struggled to score," said the 69-year-old Goorjian, who is also head coach of the Australian national team.
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"They really locked in to Myles, they really locked in to Glen. But we won the game in the last two minutes with stops ourselves. So I thought we really did a great job on their main guy in the last two minutes of the game and on their post action, and we didn't give them second shots. So the defense in the last two minutes was key."
Converge battled back from a 94-72 deficit early in the fourth and closed within 104-100 behind the efforts of import Quincy Miller and Maverick Ahanmisi with 1:29 to go.
But the FiberXers never scored from there, with Miller and Ahanmisi flubbing a three-point attempt each, before being forced to commit a foul on Powell to stop the clock.
The 6-foot-2 Powell, playing his last game with the Dragons before being replaced by big man Andrew Nicholson, hit the last two of his team-high 33 points, while Yang complemented him with a double-double of 23 points and 11 rebounds, while adding five assists in between.
Converge lost for the second straight game for a 1-2 record, with Miller topscoring for 38 points and 14 rebounds.
Ahanmisi led all locals with 12 points which he scored in the final quarter, with Allyn Bulanadi and Jeron Teng adding 11 each.
The scores:
Bay Area (106) - Powell 33, Yang 23, Zhu 20, Blankley 10, Reid 7, Lam 6, Liu 4, Ju 3, Zheng 0, Liang 0.
Converge (100) - Miller 38, Ahanmisi 12, Teng 11, Bulanadi 11, Arana 7, Tratter 7, Ilagan 7, Racal 3, Melecio 2, Stockton 2, Murrell 0, Hill 0, Ambohot 0.
Quarterscores: 28-18; 57-41; 88-69; 106-100.
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