Toyota topped Crispa in overtime but not after four players from both teams were ejected during the fourth quarter of their second elimination round meeting in the 1982 PBA Open Conference.
Toyota outplays Crispa
Fight mars game; 4 players thrown out
By Bert Eljera
Bulletin Today
Published Sunday Oct. 3, 1982
With the referees losing control, the intense Crispa-Toyota rivalry, relatively quiet for the last five years, exploded anew last night with a player fight at the Araneta Coliseum.
The Super Corollas, banking on clutch hits by Arnulfo Tuadles and Andrew Fields, outplayed the Redmanizers in overtime, 129-119, before a wildly cheering crowd of some 18,000 fans.
But the result of the explosive contest was hardly the story.
For the first time since 1977, the arch rivals figured in a brawl that saw one Crispa player — Bernard Fabiosa — suffer a bloodied right eye.
Crispa team owner Danny Floro later lashed at the referees, saying they were the culprits.
“For the first time, I say that they are lousy,” said the usually reticent Floro.
Fabiosa went down from punch by Francis Arnaiz, who later claimed he had been spat at by the Crispa guard.
Abe King swung at Fabiosa, missing him when the Crispa sentinel ducked in time, and King himself got hit from behind in return by Rudy Distrito who had rushed from the bench to aid his teammate.
All four were promptly thrown out of the game although Fabiosa vehemently protested later, saying that he was the one hit so there was no reason for him to be ejected.
The fracas erupted with one minute and 30 seconds to go in the regulation period and Toyota ahead by a point, 109-108.
The Redmanizers went on to tie the count at 111-all when play was resumed, missing a chance to win outright when Arturo Cristobal split charities and import Michael Gibson bungled an inbound pass, three ticks remaining.
In the extension, Tuadles scored six straight points in two minutes and Fields banged in five more as Toyota took a 122-116 lead, 33 seconds remaining.
Tuadles capped his heroics with five more points and Tim Coloso put on the icing on the cake with a gun-beating three-point shot.
Both coaches — Crispa’s Virgilio “Baby” Dalupan and Toyota’s Ed Ocampo — wailed the officiating.
Dalupan was particularly critical of Reynaldo Victorino, angrily confronting the balding arbiter after the game.
Ocampo said the referees were partly to blame for what happened.
“There were too many close calls that’s why the players lost their temper,” said Ocampo.
PBA Commissioner Leo Prieto said an investigation into the incident will be conducted Monday.
“Don’t ask me why they were thrown out. I was not in control. The referees were,” said Prieto, who nevertheless heaped praises on the referees for a “wonderful job.”
The victory was fifth in 10 matches for the Super Corollas while the Redmanizers suffered their sixth loss also in 10 games.
In the first game, Jerome Henderson and Curtis Berry combined for 73 points as Yco-Tanduay routed Gilbey’s Gin, 118-101, for the Esquires’ fifth win in nine games.
The Gins saw their record drop to 5-5.
The individual scores:
Toyota — 129
Koonce 32
Fields 24
Tuadles 24
Fernandez 16
King 13
Arnaiz 9
Florencio 4
Coloso 3
Relosa 2
Herrera 0
Crispa — 124
Gibson 39
Cezar 23
Fabiosa 13
Brown 12
Guidaben 10
Carpio 9
Cristobal 7
Co 6
Israel 0
Cruz 0
Villamin 0
Hubalde 0
Quarterscores: 28-26, 61-51, 89-83, 111-all, 129-119
Toyota 28 33 28 22 18 — 129
Crispa 26 25 32 28 8 — 119
Refs: R. Victorino, T. Urbano, T. de los Reyes
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