THE first coaching challenge made in a PBA game was upheld as NLEX contested an offensive foul called on Sean Anthony during its match against Blackwater on Sunday at the Caloocan Sports Complex.
Road Warriors coach Frankie Lim decided to test the league’s new coaching option when he challenged the referees’ call on a supposed Anthony foul against Joshua Torralba late in the game and NLEX trailing, 85-79.
READ: Blackwater beats NLEX at start of PBA on Tour
Upon review of the incident, the challenge proved to be a success as game officials reversed the call and charged Torralba with a foul instead, leading to two free throws by Anthony.
“It was successful, di ba. May nakita kami na naipit yung kamay ni Sean, so we called it. Successful naman,” said Lim afterwards.
Blackwater was on a 5-0 run when the NLEX coaching staff decided to challenge the call.
The Bossing still won the game though, 93-88.
Under the new rule, both teams have two coaches’ challenges during games, one each in the first and second half, provided teams still have full timeouts remaining.
A successful challenge meant the team will have ball possession and won’t be charged with a timeout.
An unsuccessful challenge though, will cost the team a full timeout.
Among calls allowed to be challenged include questions on act of shooting, foul of any kind, travelling, flopping, eight-second violation, backcourt violation, timeout/held ball, out-of-bounds, and time remaining on shot clock.
Lim has no qualms about the new rule.
“It’s OK,” he said. “Once you see something wrong, you can challenge yung mga wrong calls.”
The only problem is, the game will become even longer now.
“You have four challenges in one game. So that delays the game,” said the NLEX coach. “Yun lang ang problem dun. Humahaba yung game because of that.”
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