LA Salle is not out of the woods yet and its players are now feeling the pressure.
"We're honestly really desperate to get the win para we'll be solo third," admitted Evan Nelle after the Green Archers suffered back-to-back losses.
Not only did La Salle bungle a chance to move up to second after losing to University of the Philippines, it is now in a precarious situation after a 67-62 defeat to Far Eastern University on Tuesday.
That dropped the Green Archers to a 7-5 slate, still in third place but not assured of a Final Four spot.
It's an unenviable position to be in all the more with the dangerous Adamson and National University squads remaining in their schedule.
Lose both of those games and there's still an unfortunate chance for the green-and-white to find themselves out of the postseason for the third straight season.
Evan Nelle and the Archers are in third with two games remaining in the elimination round.
Nelle himself understood the missed chances for La Salle but he also knows that there's no sense crying over spilled milk.
"We're just focusing on one game at a time. Sayang talaga yung today kasi this was our chance to separate from everybody else. Pero we still have Thursday and Sunday to reach the Final For and get no. 3 and go on from there," he said.
For that to happen, though, La Salle must dial in and perform to coach Derick Pumaren's expectations which is to play 40 minutes of good basketball.
"As coach said, we can't you know have a bad start lalo against really good teams, tapos hahabulin lang namin and third or fourth. We've been doing that ever since the start of the season and it's really not working for us," said Nelle, who got 15 points, seven boards, and five assists in the loss.
"We just have to keep practicing, just start out strong naman para hindi kami palagi yung nag-hahabol."
Get more of the latest sports news & updates on SPIN.ph
NOTICE ON UNAUTHORIZED AND UNLAWFUL USE, PUBLICATION, AND/OR DISSEMINATION OF SPIN.PH CONTENT: Please be notified that any unauthorized and unlawful use, publication, and/or dissemination of Spin.ph’s content and/or materials is a direct violation of its legal and exclusive rights to the same, and shall be subject to appropriate legal action/s.
