League-leading Pirates target fourth straight win
ONCE again starting like a house on fire, the Lyceum Pirates seek to continue to roll to their fourth straight victory in Season 94 of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) when they take on the Arellano Chiefs today at the FilOil Flying V Centre in San Juan City.
The lone undefeated team in the NCAA in the classification phase last season, the Pirates (3-0) look to sustain another solid start for them in the tournament by adding the Chiefs to their list of conquered in their scheduled 12 noon match.
Also seeing action today are the San Sebastian Stags ( 1- 2) against the Jose Rizal University (JRU) Heavy Bombers (0-2) at 2 p.m. and the San Beda Red Lions (1-0) versus the College of St. Benilde Blazers (1-1) at 4 p.m.
Lyceum enters the contest today fresh from a dominating victory over JRU, 88-56, on July 20, that saw it flip the switch in the second to the fourth quarter to run away with the victory.
Mike Nzeusseu had a doubledouble of 21 points and 10 rebounds for Lyceum with CJ Perez and Jaycee Marcelino adding 12 points each.
“From start to finish, we want to make sure the game will be out of reach because we don’t want to
commit the same mistakes that we made in our game against EAC (Emilio Aguinaldo College) where we blew a big lead,” said Lyceum coach Topex Robinson of the mind-set they had against JRU.
EYEING 2-0
Looking to stop the Pirates and deal them their first loss of the season is Arellano, victorious in its tournament debut.
Finally saw action in Season 94 on July 19 in an “NCAA on Tour” fixture at its Arellano Gym home, the Chiefs go for a second win in a row after beating EAC, 75-69, in overtime.
Arellano showed great resilience to claw their way back to force overtime and unwavering resolve to hang on for the win against EAC in their tournament debut.
Guards Levi dela Cruz and Adrian Alban played big for Arellano in the win, with the former pouring in seven of his 12 points in OT while the latter, a transferee from Lyceum, scoring eight of his 13 points late in regulation that sent the game into OT.
“We had a big problem when we lost (Kent) Salado. We’re just thankful we have these guards to help fill the void,” said Arellano coach Jerry Codiñera referring to Dela Cruz and Alban.
Meanwhile, over the weekend the NCAA Press Corps awarded the player of the week honors to Letran Knights player JP Calvo, after leading his team to its first victory of the season.
The veteran guard took charge for the Knights in their 83-76 victory against San Sebastian last Friday.
Calvo put up 16 points on 6- for-11 shooting as he steadily controlled his team’s offense in the second half en route to the win that improved Letran’s record to 1-1.
In winning the award, Calvo beat out teammate Bong Quinto Alban and Dela Cruz of Arellano, and Yankie Haruna of St. Benilde.