Call them whatever you want: In the NBA they are deemed as the cagers who have gone fishin’. Some call them the “Final” Four, in a scathing reference to them being at the bottom of the standings. Others consider them as the Horsemen whose horses weren’t fast enough. Or simply the people who woke up late and failed to secure a seat in the Final Four bus.
By Imman Canicosa
Yes, the entire basketball community may be atwitter as the top four squads (FEU, Ateneo, Adamson, and La Salle) jockey for Final Four positions at the wind-up of the UAAP elimination rounds and are collectively crossing their fingers in anticipation for another Ateneo-La Salle collision (a dream for fans and scalpers and a nightmare for the security personnel of the Araneta Coliseum), but let’s not forget that the NU Bulldogs, UE Red Warriors, UST Growling Tigers, and the UP Fighting Maroons are squads which are likewise worthy of mention (and praise) for the efforts that they made during the season, and had a couple of games gone in their direction (except probably for UP), they would have barged into the Final Four.
NU Bulldogs. Current Record: 7-7.
Sayang. This is how I feel for this squad who was then deemed merely as a spoiler, a team which only sends ripples up the standings during the homestretch, when they are already out of contention. It happened against Ateneo three years before, against FEU a couple of years ago, and against the Green Archers only a year ago. 2010, however, is the year when the squad made splashes and showed that the management’s “200% support” as mentioned by Coach Eric Gonzales is finally bearing fruit.
Just one of the aforementioned fruits is the acquisition of Cameroonian import Emmanuel Mbe, who has lived up to his billing and has posted a double-double average of 13.2 points and 12.5 boards en route to seriously contending for the Most Valuable Player (MVP) plum. Another deadly scorer in the form of Kokoy Hermosisma has been alleviating the scoring load on the (robust) should of Mbe, as he likewise wound up as one the top ten scorers in the league as he averages 11.5 points an outing.
A four win-improvement from last season’s 3-11 campaign may be a trifle in the pros, but in the collegiate ranks wherein a single win can spell the difference between qualifying and being booted out of Final Four contention, three wins is a lot. In fact their current 6-7 card is the best record that the Sampaloc-based quintet has mustered since 2001, the year when the team rode on the sniping of now-Bullpups Head Coach Jeff Napa and danced their way to the Final Four. Nine years seemed like an eternity, but when a team shows promise as much as the Bulldogs did this season, then that nine-year drought might just come to an end.
UE Red Warriors. Current Record: 6-8.
A friend of mine remarked as the first round debacle of the Recto-based dribblers continued that they could be headed to a 0-14 season– which is a stark contrast to their 2007 campaign wherein they casted a shadow over the rest of the league and compiled an immaculate 14-0 card.
But I said that it wouldn’t happen, because the team, although still reeling from the loss of players like last season’s Defensive Player of the Year (and newly-minted Alaska Milkman) Elmer Espiritu, Pari Llagas, Val Acuna, and even players like Rudy Lingganay, still has enough talent to at least contend for the last slot in the Final Four. It might have happened a little late on schedule, but it did happen.
Their triumph over then-second-running Adamson Falcons wherein the wards of Leo Austria groped for form in the fourth quarter was already an indication of how the team with the free-flowing offense (as freely flowing as the locks of their mentor, Coach Lawrence Chongson) can also put the defensive clamps down on their opponents when necessary, which was again proven against Ateneo and La Salle.
Their current record should not be the barometer of the way they are playing in the second round. Paul Lee, who has done more than carry his team on his shoulders, has finally found a slot man incarnate of Espiritu and Llagas in the reedy Ken Acibar, who, through the course of only a few games, has metamorphosed into a bankable big man who can score and corral that rebound. James Martinez jacking up basketballs from three-point distance has also become an indelible image in Warriors basketball, and sparkplugs like Kit Rosopa, Paul Zamar, and Raphy Reyes also have been helping their cause.
“The whole community is depending on us. We just wanted to show our character. And today, the boys did that. They showed out true character,” says Chongson of his Warriors.
The way they played this season, the UE Red Warriors is a team that is well-named.
UST Growling Tigers. Current Record 4-10.
Teams jump into seemingly insurmountable leads and rejoice in their apparent victory. And then, as slow as a scene from The Godfather, the other team claws its way back into the game, and eventually manages to cut the lead into a few points. But alas, luck runs out as a costly turnover or a shot which clangs at the side of the rim ends the struggle as the final horn heralds the end of the game. This has been how most of the losses came about for the team of Coach Pido Jarencio, who steered the squad to a championship back in Season 69.
Now, four years removed from that title, the Tigers have again failed to make it to the Final Four for the second time in three years. Like the previous year, he pulled his boys from joining the summer leagues and kept his cards close to his chest. The gamble once again paid off, as they cruised past a stunned UE side during their first game. But eventually the team lost steam, losing a string of games before finally bowing out of the race for the last slot.
Something positive which can be drawn from this season is that the team is young, and, like our representatives in the Youth Olympic Games, their stint this year could be added to their experience coming into the next season. UST is a squad which lives and dies through their vaunted perimeter shooting, and in most of their losses, their shots simply refused to fall.
UP Fighting Maroons. Current Record. 0-14.
If UST chose to keep their activities shrouded in a veil of secrecy, then UP is the exact opposite as the squad joined various tournaments such as a stint in the Cobra franchise of the PBL which finished a second and a promising finish at the Fil-Oil Pre-Season Tournament in a spirited effort to top their 3-11 record last season. Their decent finishes had pundits deeming them to make it to the Final Four, but once the festivities were started, the team seemingly never got off the right foot, suffering thirteen consecutive losses.
Their defeats overshadowed the fact that they found a gem of a rookie in Mike Silungan and a decent showing from big man Magi Sison, who is averaging a near-double-double of 11 points and nine rebounds per game.
Perhaps the most bitter of their encounters against other squads were their bouts with the NU Bulldogs. Their first match saw the Diliman-based dribblers scorching the nets and racing to a 21-point halftime lead, only to see the Bulldogs mount a comeback. Then came their controversial second round meeting, in which the final seconds became a mockery: NU’s Jewel Ponferrada kept missing the free throw intentionally, but UP’s Alvin Padilla kept on intentionally committing a lane violation so the Maroons would get the ball back. This happened for about five times, and then the referees decided they had enough. They decided to forego another lane violation, and UP’s tactician Boyet Fernandez was livid and placed the game under protest, a protest which was ultimately turned down.
As for the reason for their debacle this season, some point to their change in coaching during the midst of the season. Others claim that they simply do not have enough talent. My take on this is simply because the team was just plain unlucky. Definitely the team is brimming with talent and is loaded with veterans. They lost games which could have gone either way, and on some dates, their shots simply weren’t falling. During their second round meeting against La Salle, they lost their athletic guard Mark Lopez during the third quarter, and, a few minutes later, also lost team captain Woody Co due to another injury. If that isn’t misfortune, then I don’t know what is.
