PBA officials to suspend umpire responsible for the late missed call in the highly contested match between the Meralco Bolts and Bay Area Dragons.
The PBA admitted a crucial missed call by a referee against the Meralco Bolts in the dying seconds of its slim 92-89 win over the league leading Bay Area Dragons on Nov. 4, at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
Deputy Commissioner Eric Castro confirmed the news after the game, following an intensive review of the point of the game where umpire Jerry Narandan indeed missed to call the crucial violation inside the final 20 seconds of the game.
"We missed that call," said Castro.
The league said the referee is facing a possible one rotation suspension or at least three to four games for the late-game blunder.
The play in question was the Bolts’ possession after a missed three-pointer by Glen Yang which was rebounded by Meralco’s center Raymond Almazan with 20.9s left in the game clock.
Almazan then passed the ball to Allein Maliksi who almost lost the ball but managed to gather before passing it to Aaron Black, still in the back court, then passing the ball to Bong Quinto into their frontcourt with only 9.4s left in the game.
However, despite the unfortunate missed call, Bay Area still had the chance to send the game to overtime after Allein Maliksi missed both his free throws with 3.5s left.
Bay Area head coach Brian Goorjan was visibly furious by the no- call after calling a timeout to design a play for Kobey Lamb who failed to score in its final possession with 2.8s left in the clock on a three-point heave.
According to deputy Castro, the play wasn't reviewable.
"So pinasabi ko na lang kay coach Brian na we missed that call," Castro said, "Crucial yun."
Dragons then absorbed their second loss in the conference with the Bolts recovering from a three-game skid, putting to waste the 50 points from import Andrew Nicholson.
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