This appears in the Friday, June 7, 2013 edition of the Business Mirror.
Filoil
semis: mastery or revenge
The semifinals of the Filoil Flying V
Hanes Premier Cup have two scenarios: mastery or revenge.
National University, San Beda College,
University of the East, and the University of Santo Tomas are the last four
teams standing from an 18-team pool and they will do battle today to decide who
advances to the finals of the summer’s preeminent basketball tournament at the
Filoil Flying V Arena in San Juan.
The UE Red Warriors take on the UST
Growling Tigers at 2pm and it will be the second time these two opponents take
each other on in this tournament. Both team battled last May 18 with UE running
away with a 85-68 win behind the 17-point outburst of Ralf Olivarez and the 16
markers tacked on by Jay-R Sumido.
In that match up, UE didn’t play
without its African center Charles Mamie who was benched by head coach Boycie
Zamar for breaking team rules. Yet it didn’t matter as his all-Filipino crew
comfortably led throughout the whole match. Instead of taking advantage of
Mammie’s absence, UST got a subpar outing from its third year Cameroonian
center Karim Abdul who tallied five points and eight rebounds in 23 minutes.
“Masarap na laban ‘to,” observed
Zamar. “UST has played better since as they have received consistent
contributions from its bench (in Ed Daquioag, Paolo Pe and Kim Lo). I expect my
boys, my bench to step up as well.”
The match up will also pit two of the
best Africans in the college ranks today. UST’s Abdul has averaged 9.7 points,
9.3 rebounds, 0.9 assists, 0.3 steals, and 0.9 blocks in seven matches while
UE’s Mammie has produced more solid numbers in six matches with 14.2 points,
11.7 rebounds, 0.3 steals, and 0.2 blocks per outing.
In the main game at 4pm, San Beda will
get another crack at National University who defeated them in the very first
match of the tournament, 73-71.
San Beda lost in overtime when Baser
Amer missed a chance to ice the game in regulation with a missed free throw.
That allowed NU’s Ray Parks to send the match into extra minutes where he
scored six points with backup guard Cedric Labing-isa hitting the marginal
point. The Red Lions had a chance to forge another extension but poor execution
in their final play saw NU come away triumphant.
In their quarterfinals matches, both sides
had to work hard to advance as NU squeaked past Letran, 69-67. The Knights likewise
executed poorly in the game’s final minute allowing NU to remain unscathed.
On the other hand, the Red Lions shut
down La Salle in the final four minutes as they came back from a 10-point
deficit to win 66-63.
“NU is the team to beat,” noted SBC
head coach Boyet Fernandez after his team’s quarterfinals win. “They have been
undefeated in two years now in this tournament and they have very capable
Africans with them. We will just have to play team basketball to win.”
On his part, NU head coach Eric
Altamirano said the Bulldogs have struggled since their return from a pocket
tournament in Australia where they were mostly blown away by the tougher
competition. “Meron din close games. And hopefully, this close win against
Letran will help us be tougher in closing out games. San Beda is used to that
as well so it will be a good match up.”
Fernandez noted that in their opening
day loss to NU, Amer wilted under the pressure. Against La Salle, he scored 10
of his team’s last 13 points. “I think Baser had like five points against NU in
that game,” recalled Fernandez who is in his first year with the reigning NCAA
champions. “Now is his time to shine.”
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