Eagles twice to beat; UP wins
Ateneo put University of the East scoring machine Alvin Pasaol out of the equation and extinguished whatever chance the Red Warriors had of stopping the Blue Eagle juggernaut.
Throwing their defensive weight and running like clockwork on the other end, the high-flying Eagles scored a routine 97-73 disposal to soar to their 11th straight win and clinch a twice-to-beat bonus in the Final Four yesterday in the UAAP Season 80 men’s basketball tourney at MOA Arena.
The Eagles are now three wins away from a 14-game sweep of the elims, which will mean an automatic trip to the finals.
In the second game, Paul Desiderio showed his bigtime endgame shooting again, knocking down the marginal trey with 1.1 seconds left as University of the Philippines rallied past Far Eastern, 59-56, to forge a tie for fourth with its victims at 5-6.
Just like in the dying seconds against Santo Tomas back in the first round, Desiderio didn’t hesitate to take the leather with the game on the line.
As the UP crowd chanted “Atin Ito,” mimicking his statement in the huddle before that gamewinner against UST,” Desiderio took the leather, shook off nemesis Ron Dennison and confidently launched a triple that went in, completing a 16-3 windup that sealed the deal.
‘Big morale-boosting win for us,” said UP mentor Bo Perasol, whose team snapped a twogame slide and stayed in the hunt for F4. “As I said before, our struggles are something we had to undergo in order for us to grow.”
Desiderio topscored with 15 while clamping down long-time Cebu rival Dennison to nine.
“My mindset is on getting back at Dennison, he’s been getting the better of our match-up prior to this,” said the UP star. The scores: First Game AdMU 97 – Ravena 17, Mendoza 13, Tolentino 12, Verano 12, Asistio 9, Porter 9, Ikeh 7, Mi.Nieto 7, Mamuyac 3, Andrade 2, Black 2, Go 2, Ma. Nieto 2, Tio 0, White 0.
UE 73 – Maloles 20, Olayon 15, Pasaol 8, Bartolome 7, Cullar 5, Varilla 5, Acuno 4, Derige 4, Manalang 3, Conner 2, Cruz 0, Toribio 0. Quarterscores: 21-18, 48-35, 71-52, 97-73 Second Game UP 59 – Desiderio 15, Ouattara 10, Ju. Gomez de Liano 7, Manzo 7, Ja. Gomez de Liano 6, Lim 6, Vito 5, Lao 2, Jaboneta 1, Rocafort 0, Dario 0, Battad 0, Romero 0, Prado 0, Webb 0.
FEU 56 – Parker 13, Tolentino 12, Dennison 9, Comboy 6, Trinidad 4, Cani 3, Orizu 3, Ramirez 3, Tuffin 2, Ebona 1, Inigo 0.
Quarterscores: 14-18, 32-25, 37-47, 59-56