Is college hoops a job for the pros?

A Job for the Pros?

by rick olivares

When the University Athletics Association of the Philippines opens on July 10, 2010, the two most popular collegiate leagues (including the older National Collegiate Athletic Association) will be in full swing.

Talk will center around who will make the Final Four and win the championship as well as the promising rookies and the veterans who are expected to step up. The coaches – the new faces and those on the hot seat – will also be topic of conversation but curiously, there’s an interesting angle among them that should not be ignored.

Six of the nine NCAA coaches and five of the eight UAAP benchmasters played in the Philippine Basketball Association. To wit:

NCAA: 

Ato Agustin (San Miguel) 

Frankie Lim (Alaska) 

Vergel Meneses (Pop Cola/Swift) 

Richard del Rosario (Sta. Lucia) 

Chito Victolero (Sta. Lucia) 

Leo Isaac (Ginebra San Miguel)

UAAP: 

Norman Black (San Miguel)

Glenn Capacio (Purefoods)

Pido Jarencio (Ginebra San Miguel)

Leo Austria (Shell)

Dindo Pumaren (Purefoods)

Letran head coach Louie Alas was drafted by Purefoods in 1989 but he suffered a career-ending ACL injury in the pre-season. Had he been healthy, he would have been teammates with Dindo Pumaren, Glenn Capacio, Jerry Codinera, and Alvin Patrimonio in that storied line-up.

Does this represent a shift in the hiring of former pros? Does that mean they make better coaches as opposed to former players who have come full circle for their alma maters?

Not necessarily. What it simply means is that it is possible now to make basketball a real profession. Before salaries skyrocketed into the stratosphere (thanks to Alvin Patrimonio), many college players chose to get a real job as they made more money in the corporate world. Today, a pro career means that players have a chance to be in the game longer than the four or five years that college eligibility permits. In the pros, they get to study the game a little more especially in recent years when zone defenses were finally allowed.

In the UAAP, the first former PBA player to lead a school to a title was U-Tex Wrangler and former Blue Eagle Fritz Gaston. Ateneo won the title in 1988 under his watch.

In 1998, former San Miguel Beerman and Green Archer Franz Pumaren masterminded La Salle’s four-peat. He won one more title in 2007 following the school’s return from a one-year suspension.

Joel Banal, the former Mapua King Cardinal and Great Taste Coffee Maker and self-proclaimed Franz Pumaren stopper, piloted Ateneo to the 2002 men’s basketball crown.

Another San Miguel Beerman, but one who made a bigger name for himself with Ginebra San Miguel, Pido Jarencio pulled one over former teammate and coach Norman Black in the 2006 UAAP Finals. Black, the first ever Mr. 100% Awardee (Bobby Parks is the other) who also won 10 PBA crowns (nine with San Miguel and one with Sta. Lucia) finally conquered college hoops with back-to-back titles with Ateneo in 2008 and 2009.

Over at the NCAA, Ato Agustin piloted San Sebastian to the crown in his first year while the Alaska Aces’ Frankie Lim steered the San Beda Red Lions to the latter two titles of a three-peat.

Serving as assistants for their respective teams are FEU’s Richie Ticzon (Ateneo and Shell), Adamson’s Jing Ruiz (Letran and Shell), UP’s Jerry Codinera (UE and Purefoods), San Beda’s Ed Cordero (UST and Toyota), and La Salle’s Tonichi Yturri (La Salle and San Miguel).

The last three non-PBA players to have any significant coaching success were Aric del Rosario who scored a four-peat with UST, the timeless Turo Valenzona who catapulted both the FEU Tamaraws and San Sebastian Stags to a back-to-back crown and five-peat respectively, and Koy Banal who led FEU to two titles and San Beda its long awaited return to the promised land with the seniors crown in 2006.

In the case of Ateneo’s Norman Black, his success both as a player and as a coach in the pros is an attraction to potential recruits. Former Blue Eagle Nonoy Baclao recalled being thrilled to be recruited by Black. And now having also won a bushel load of titles in the past three years should add to the attraction of donning blue and white. Offered Black, “Many don’t really remember my days in the PBA, but players and kids today – they know what we’ve accomplished in Ateneo.”

Now for the sake of argument, which league has the better pro players?