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Allan Caidic on his 79-point game: My mind was on my wife giving birth to our kid

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<figure class="op-interactive"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameBorder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/DH8odfj1vvw" width="560"></iframe></figure>(UPDATED) Allan Caidic reached the ultimate state of basketball unconsciousness when he tallied 79 points on 17 3-pointers on November 21, 1991, two PBA scoring records that still stand to this day.“I was probably in the zone at the time,” said Caidic, visibly underplaying his achievement in an interview with Eric Menk on his &quot;Staying Major&quot; podcast that was posted on <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCI6Tot1BSeAhj2ESuo6_aFg" target="_blank">YouTube</a> on Friday.An interesting backstory he shared with Menk was the fact that he hadn&#x27;t intended to dress up for his team, Tivoli Ice Cream, that night because his wife Milot was due to give birth to their first baby about the same time.&quot;I had no plans of playing,&quot; Caidic recalled. &quot;When (my wife) started laboring, the doctor told me, &#x27;You’re too tense. You relax and maybe, you can just go to the game, play and come back here.&quot;When he got to the ULTRA, the previous name of the PhilSports Arena in Pasig, he opened up to his coach, Jimmy Mariano, that he wasn&#x27;t mentally prepared to be on the basketball court given his wife&#x27;s condition.Caidic&#x27;s Tivoli was to play Ginebra San Miguel in a no-bearing game, and Caidic planned to sit through most of it.Trying to light a fire in his teammates in an inconsequential game, Abe King, one of the toughest defenders and meanest rebounders in PBA history, gave an unusual powwow at halftime.&quot;He told the guys, he encouraged us, &#x27;Let’s break a record,&#x27; to make the game more exciting,&quot; Caidic said. The mark King had in mind? Shattering the league record 15 3-pointers in a game made by Caidic himself in November 1989.So every possession was designed almost exclusively for Caidic to get a shot from downtown, the 1990 MVP recalled.&quot;When I got to 17 3-pointers, they pulled me out,&quot; he said.But the last thing a team and a coach want to do is to sit down their best shooter when he is as hot as Caidic was and when history was within reach. So Caidic was fielded back in to pad his point total, surpass the previous mark set by Paul Alvarez when he registered 71 points in April 1990, and establish a new single-game scoring record by a homegrown player.On a day when his mind was drifting somewhere else, for Caidic to reach god mode and explode on offense the way he did, it made the feat more impressive.“It’s very hard to sit on the bench thinking about your wife giving birth to your first child. I’d rather focus on something else,” Caidic said.There are a lot more tidbits that Caidic shared on the podcast, such as his scoring outburst during one game in the 1990 Asian Games despite an injury on his shooting hand. He also talked about his fondness for the game of Klay Thompson, the current NBA player who he thinks resembles his playing style the most.Menk has more of these podcasts with former and current PBA players on his <a href="https://www.ericmenk.com/">website</a>. They&#x27;re all worth listening to if you&#x27;re nuts for local basketball stories.<div>For more sports coverage, visit the <a href="http://sports.abs-cbn.com/" target="_blank">ABS-CBN Sports</a> website.</div>

On a day when his mind was drifting somewhere else, for Caidic to reach god mode and explode for 79 points, it made the feat more impressive.

On a day when his mind was drifting somewhere else, for Caidic to reach god mode and explode for 79 points, it made the feat more impressive.