On Ateneo’s win over NU and looking at the passing

On Ateneo’s win over NU and looking at the passing

by rick olivares

The Ateneo Blue Eagles picked up two huge wins over the past week including the 79-64 win over the National University Bulldogs who bowed out of Final Four contention with the loss.

I’d like to point out a few things during Ateneo’s win.

The twin double doubles by Thirdy Ravena and Angelo Kouame.

Thirdy finished with 23 points and 12 boards while Kouame had 19-17. That was a monster tag-team combination. And between the two of them, they had seven blocks!

The excellent substitution.

This one is dicey. Some players enter and get the job done; some don’t. In this game, everyone got something done with regards to the overall result and effort. Coach Tab Baldwin sent in 14 players (the Nieto brothers were on the bench but chalked up a DNP-CD) and everyone contributed to the stat sheet and not necessarily in points.

With Matt Nieto unavailable for the past four matches, Tyler Tio picked up the slack and gave a very good account of himself. SJ Belangel has played better but this game was his best of his rookie year so far as he tallied 11 points, 3 assists, and 2 rebounds against zero turnovers. Tyler hit a big triple and had 4 assists although he did commit his first two turnovers since he began to start. Still not bad. Tyler might have not scored a lot, but he was still a stabilizing presence on the court.

Adrian Wong was solid in this game. Not huge numbers, but he was steady and more sure of himself. Here’s to him continuing that.

Gian Mamuyac continues to provide quality minutes. And even the BJ Andrade cameo was noteworthy.

Some might note that Anton Asistio has struggled to score in the past two games for Ateneo. He hasn’t had too many looks as opposing teams try to shut him down. Jolo Mendoza played well against UE and versus NU, in spite of missing 21 shots from the three-point arc, Ateneo continued to pound the Bulldogs from the inside.

With Ateneo shutting down the interior of NU, the Bulldogs had no choice but to shoot from the outside.

Ateneo pummeled NU inside 42-18 with Issa Gaye and Troy Rike pretty much rendered non-factors.

The outside shooting of NU prevented the game from being a massive blowout. NU hit six treys in the second half with John Lloyd Clemente dropping three, Dave Ildefonso nailing two, and Dave Yu adding one.

This was the first game where Ateneo got burned from the outside but they still managed to win this season. Well, that is because they posted a huge halftime lead and were able to answer most of NU’s second half runs. However, I should say that in the last two games, UE and NU scored more than they did in the second half. So there is that huge first half cushion and stepping off the gas pedal.

A note on the total team passing.

Now, in the last two games, I wanted to keep track of the passing. It doesn’t correlate to much except that Ateneo really tries to look for the open man. Does it mean they score more? Not necessarily as sometimes, they take shots with the shot clock winding down. And that isn’t always the best shot.

Again, it doesn’t correlate to anything, but it is an interesting thing to look at. Here it is.

Ateneo vs NU passes

	Total Passes	Points Scored	FG%	Turnovers
1st Qtr	68	22	40%	3
2nd Qtr	56	25	50%	3
3rd Qtr	47	18	44%	3
4th Qtr	72	14	22%	0

NU vs Ateneo passes

	Total Passes	Points Scored	FG%	Turnovers
1st Qtr	42	11	17%	4
2nd Qtr	60	14	40%	5
3rd Qtr	52	22	40%	3
4th Qtr	54	17	37%	4

How about the UE game?

Ateneo vs UE passes

	Total Passes	Points Scored	FG%	Turnovers
1st Qtr	71	29	52%	4
2nd Qtr	77	28	38%	11
3rd Qtr	86	16	35%	6
4th Qtr	52	17	43%	5

UE vs Ateneo passes

	Total Passes	Points Scored	FG%	Turnovers
1st Qtr	57	15	41%	6
2nd Qtr	59	9	54%	7
3rd Qtr	37	27	71%	4
4th Qtr	45	19	42%	3

How did UE score more points on fewer passes? Quick strikes and fastbreaks. Take note that Ateneo sent in its bench and struggled.

What is still interesting is how Ateneo really moves that ball around finding teammates in the best possible position to score.