Tien Lei's monster 32-point second half, including the game-winning shot with 13.8 seconds left in the game, rallied the Dacin Tigers from deficits as large as 17 points to top the Yulon Dinos 77-75 at the Taipei Physical Education College Gym on Thursday evening.
The dramatic Game-5 victory over the top-ranked Dinos not only earned the fourth-seeded Tigers a ticket to the SBL Finals against Taiwan Beer at the Taipei Physical Education College Gymnasium tonight at 8:30 pm, but also kept the three-time defending champs out of title contention for the first time in four years.
`Huge win'
PHOTO: FANG PIN CHAO, TAIPEI TIMES
"It was a huge win for us, especially after they [the Dinos] had won two in a row to force the decisive fifth game in the series," Dacin skipper Liu Jia-fa said after the game.
His troops nearly repeated history by losing three straight after claiming Game 1 and Game 2 in last year's first-round series against Taiwan Beer.
Tien, the three-time league MVP winner, proved his worth despite a dismal six-point outing during the first half by accounting for more than 60 percent of the Tigers' 53 second-half points, helping the Tigers become the first No. 4 seeds to make it into the SBL Finals.
"I really couldn't get many good shots off in the first half because they [the Dinos] always had someone on me, but with A-Yong [Lee Fong-yong] picking up the scoring slack, they had to ease up the coverage on me in the second half," Tien said of the big difference in his performance in the halves.
Lee, the unsung hero for the Tigers, quadrupled his normal scoring production of five with 20 points on the night to go along his solid defense.
The game began with neither team able to find its range in a sloppily played first quarter that saw the Dinos leading the Tigers 14-9.
However, the Tigers were able to rediscover their shooting touch in the second quarter, although the Dinos led 39-24 at the half.
Five combined three-pointers by Tien and Lee would tip the scale in favor of the Tigers during the third quarter, when the Dinos suddenly lost their feel for the ball as the Tigers poured in 29 points while the Dinos netted only a dozen to lead 53-51.
The Tigers would actually take leads as large seven points midway through the final quarter on the strength of Tien's red-hot shooting.
But the Dinos responded with a 10-3 run over a three-minute span to force a 75-75 tie with 35.4 seconds remaining on the clock, setting the stage for Tien's game-clinching blow.
"We knew this would be a tough series for us with them beating us twice already during the regular season," Dinos coach Lee Yun-kuan said after the game.
Tonight's Action
All eyes will be focused on Tien and Taiwan Beer's Lin "the Beast" Chih-jeh in Game 1 of this year's Finals tonight as the two front-runners for the coveted league MVP honor try to build their case for the top annual award by going head-to-head in the best-of-seven set.
While the individual success of Tien and Lin will have a bearing on the outcome of this series, the production of their supporting casts over the course of a potentially arduous seven-game stretch will determine who wins the championship.
This means that at least two more Tigers players will need to rise to the occasion to occupy the Taiwan Beer defense while Ho Sho-cheng and Ha Hsiao-yuan of the beer crew must step up to the plate to provide support for Lin.
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