Bay Area coach after Finals Game 2 win: ‘We defended without fouling’

Bay Area bounced back from a Christmas day beating and leveled the best-of-seven championship series at 1 game apiece after returning the favor to Brgy. Ginebra, 99-82, Wednesday night inside a jampacked Smart Araneta Coliseum.

Dragons head coach Brian Goorjian bared that his team was able to adapt to the calls of the game officials, something that they weren’t able to accomplish during the Finals opener last Sunday at the SM Mall of Asia Arena in Pasay City.

“We go on this game, the game is about easy baskets, offensive rebounds and putbacks and putting the team together on the foul line. Tonight, we defended without fouling. We made the adjustments according to the PBA rules of playing the game without fouling,” explained Goorjian.

“We are in a series in your country, the PBA and the rules that are played in Australia were different in the rules in America and the rules in America were different than the international rule, that was the first game in a finals series,” added the concurrent coach of Australia’s national basketball team.

Even after securing the much-needed victory, Goorjian maintained that he never complained about officiating and stressed that it’s his job to adjust to the calls and rules since they are the guest team.

“We didn’t complain about the referees. All we tried to do was figure out how the game is going to be called and make adjustments. That was my job in between games,” said Goorjian.

“No one on our team is sick. No one in our team is hurt. There are no excuses. They kicked our ass,” he added in reference to their Game 1 defeat.

Now that they have picked up a breakthrough victory in the title round, Goorjian is hoping his wards would keep in mind all the lessons they have learned and apply it for the remainder of the series.

“Moving forward, we have to stay in that page.”