MANILA, Philippines — Freego Jeans leaned on a big third quarter explosion to bring down the highly-rated Maynilad, 88-81, and advance to the quarterfinals of the PBA D-League Foundation Cup Thursday at The Arena in San Juan.

With Eric Camson, Lester Alvarez and Alex Nuyles waxing hot, Freego Jeans pulled away in the third quarter before warding off a late charge by the Water Dragons to forge a one-game duel with Cebuana Lhuillier for a berth in the semifinals.

Camson and Alvarez shared the scoring honors with 25 points while Nuyles chipped in 18 markers, including seven in the third that helped spark a blistering run.

Freego coach Leo Austria and team manager credited the win to Nuyles’ much-improved confidence for the win.

"I think one factor for us is that we we're able to make early preparations even before the start of the playoffs," said Austria, whose wards nearly beat Maynilad's sister team NLEX in their last classification round campaign.

The Jeans Masters fell behind, 50-45, but they managed to wipe it out after Nuyles fuelled a 15-2 run that saw them post a 66-53 lead.

But Maynilad, which was coming off a three-week training as part of San Beda's preparation for the NCAA wars, made things interesting when Garvo Lanete scored after stealing a pass by Alvarez with 53.7 ticks left to pull within

84-81.

Alvarez, however, made up for his mistake when he hit a long jumper off the outstretched arms of Anjo Caram to make it 86-81, with 31.7 seconds to go.

Melo Lim led the Water Dragons in a losing cause with 15 points while Lanete, averaging almost 21 points per game, scored 14 points as they again played minus star center Sudan Daniel because of a knee injury.