ABL: Barracudas stun off-form Patriots, 71-56

The Philippine Patriots tasted their first defeat in the AirAsia Asean Basketball League, losing to the host Brunei Barracudas, 56-71, at the Brunei Indoor Stadium. The Patriots started out flat and were held to just two points the entire first quarter. No one except import Donald Little could produce points for the Patriots, who weren’t able to recover from their frustrating performance in the first 10 minutes and easily bowed to the Barracudas. “We started flat," said Patriots’ coach Louie Alas, who couldn’t hide his disappointment from the sound beating his team got from the Barracudas. “We had a good start for a brief moment in the second quarter, but Donald (Little) went into foul trouble. Then, in the middle part of the game, we managed to regain our bearing but failed to sustain the momentum," added Alas. After doing the right things in their first four games, the Patriots came up with a lackluster show against the Barracudas. Egay Billones was the only local player who finished in double figures with 19 points. He even had more production than Little, who was held down to 11 markers since he got into early foul trouble. In contrast, the Barracudas got timely contributions from imports Chris Commons and Christopher Garnett as well as Ramsey Williams as they combined for 52 points, propelling their team to only their second win in six outings. “It’s nice to win over the Patriots. It’s more special because we were the first team to beat them," said Brunei’s Filipino coach Bong Ramos, who once coached Air21 Express in the PBA. - KY, RCJ, GMANews.TV