Ang Sarap Maging Atenista 4x

Talk about a season for the ages. 

13-1 elimination round record. 2 blue chip rookies in the mythical five. A PHENOMenal rookie of the year. Championship games = blowouts. A finals MVP who shot 78% from the field. And of course, a fourth straight championship.

Most people outside of the community either admire or get irritated with the way Ateneans these days bring that swag of being the champs of the UAAP. Even though I didn't end up studying at the LS for college, I maintained that same irritating passion for the team despite studying in UP. 

Why?

More than just spending 12 years of my life in blue, I was already in Grade School when it was the sports program's so-called "dark ages". There was a time when having a competitive game against the likes of the late 90's Archers or Growling Tigers was already a stretch. There was a time when Ateneo was almost a bottom dweller. Heck, I only knew about the Final Four format when Ateneo got pretty competitive in the year 2001 and were challengers for the UAAP plum. It was that bad.  

Who could not forget the time when the Joe Lipa-coached Blue Eagles were trounced by the Archers in 2001. That did sting so much as it piled on some frustration and who wants to lose a championship series to your arch-rivals? But at the same time, it was the start of a new era. Take note: that season became the third of a string of 13 straight Final Four appearances - wherein Ateneo was always at least a 3rd seed.

Since 2001, the team went to the finals 6 times and won 5 times. Talk about a high batting rate.

Coming from last year's considerably improbable championship (given that the team lost Rabeh, Nonoy and Jai all in the same year), Ateneans were in a giddy when the team recruited the likes of Greg Slaughter and Kiefer Ravena. Basically, it was championship or bust.

Thankfully, they did deliver. 

Ladies and Gentlemen, your FOUR PEAT UAAP MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONS.

Alex Nuyles playing for Ateneo??

After that monster game against my blue eagles, I've gained much more respect for Adamson's Alex Nuyles. His heart for his alma mater and for the game is undoubtedly at full swing. I wouldn't complain if he beat Greg for league MVP.

But wait, did he really play for Ateneo? Read the interesting story here.

Basketball Sunday

Today was another great day for Philippine basketball. This hoops crazy country was lucky to witness games at all levels - collegiate, professional and international.

UAAP Games:

1PM UST vs UP, 66-49.

3pm ADMU vs FEU, 69-49.

Jones Cup:

7pm PHL vs TWN, 90-78.

PBA Governor's Cup Finals:

7pm Petron vs Talk n Text, 89-88.

Thank you Danny I, for ending this day with a bang! Kudos!

The GUIDON – One year off: Ryan Buenafe’s mea culpa

The GUIDON – One year off: Ryan Buenafe’s mea culpa

Phenom Dunk

Still not sold on Kiefer? Take a look at this!

Aaron Atayde put it best. "Yung ginagawa nya sa Juniors, ginagawa nya rin sa Seniors."

He used to dominate the Juniors division this way. 1 year detached from High School basketball, he's slowly dominating the Seniors division as well!

Watch the video here: http://yfrog.com/mbvd0z

Overhyped?

Photo from: http://www.interaksyon.com/interaktv/five-things-we-learned-after-ateneos-round-one-defeat-of-la-salle

The Phenom has arrived.

Check his stat line: 24 points (22 in the first half), 10 rebounds, 4 assists and 5 steals. He torched Simon Atkins for god's sake.

Overhyped? I don't think so.

Maroons win!

photo from interaksyon.tv

Had the Final Four start today, the Fighting Maroons would have made it. haha

Cheers!

UAAP Season 74 1st round schedule

UAAP 74 FIRST ROUND MEN'S BASKETBALL SCHEDULE

(SUBJECT TO CHANGE)

Source: http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Official-ABS-CBN-Sports-Page/283004042268

Sunday, Jul 10

Araneta Coliseum

12:30pm Primer

1pm FEU vs DLSU

3pm ADMU vs AdU

Thursday, Jul 14

Araneta Coliseum

1pm NU vs UST

3pm UE vs UP

Saturday, Jul 16

Araneta Coliseum

11am AdU vs FEU

3pm DLSU vs ADMU

Sunday, Jul 17

Araneta Coliseum

1pm UP vs NU

3pm UST vs UE

Thursday, Jul 21

Araneta Coliseum

1pm ADMU vs NU

3pm FEU vs UE

Saturday, Jul 23

Araneta Coliseum

1pm DLSU vs UP

3pm UE vs ADMU

Sunday, Jul 24

Philsports Complex

1pm NU vs FEU

3pm UST vs AdU

Thursday, Jul 28

Philsports Complex

1pm AdU vs UE

3pm NU vs DLSU

Saturday, Jul 30

Araneta Coliseum

1pm UP vs ADMU

3pm UST vs FEU

Sunday, Jul 31

Philsports Complex

1pm DLSU vs UE 20

3pm AdU vs NU

Thursday, Aug 4

Araneta Coliseum

1pm UP vs FEU

3pm ADMU vs UST

Saturday, Aug 6

Araneta Coliseum

23 1pm UE vs NU

3pm DLSU vs AdU

Sunday, Aug 7

Araneta Coliseum

1pm UST vs UP

3pm FEU vs ADMU

Thursday, Aug 11

Araneta Coliseum

1pm UP vs AdU

3pm UST vs DLSU

Repost: 12 on the 12th - Ateneo wins its first title of 2011

Text and photos by Rick Olivares (Source: http://www.ateneo.edu/index.php?p=120&type=2&sec=27&aid=9954)

Sometimes I wondered if the stories I used to hear from the adult folk were war stories. Yep, war stories not sports ones.

As a kid in the Ateneo Grade School, the first sport you ever play is football and that explains this eternal fixation with the beautiful game. Baseball, I inherited from my grandfather and I played it extensively all the way to first year college.

Hoops. Now that was something I heard about when my dad, his classmates, friends, and officemates gathered around a case of beer and whatnot. I never really played it until well after college.

One of my dad’s best friends was a red-blooded Bedan. My Tito Ramon went to school in Mendiola for his entire school life. Plus, he was a cheerleader. That meant he saw the entire ruckus up front.

When people talk about Ateneo-San Beda games (it’s usually the 1960s & 70s NCAA matches because they were around for those), it’s many things --- Caloy Loyzaga, Rusty Cacho, three-peat after three-peat, rumbles, broken windshields, and well, more rumbles. Sometimes even school officials joined the fray! Imagine that.

For me, what comes to mind is 1977. It’s as if 1975 and 76 – back-to-back title years for the Blue Eagles in the old NCAA in case you were born yesterday – never happened. Some people, including those on the Ateneo team who played in 1977, live in a time warp.

The loss, in a closed-door match at the Araneta Coliseum, remains a painful memory and even overshadows the back-to-back crowns. In recent years, I sat down with many players from both sides who participated in the finals of that year. For the Bedans, it was a huge victory as they time and again kept the Ateneans from replicating a three-peat. For the Ateneans, some shake their heads at it while ruing the time when three players were on national duty. That game was against San Beda. It was the one loss in the elims. Had they swept it then it was bonfire time. Instead, it went to a finals series where Ateneo lost in the final seconds of play.

I’ve seen the game tape and when I think of that match, I always see Pons Valdez with his head hung low and Padim Israel sitting on the floor in shock.

So, much is made about the first finals meeting in a tournament between the two college teams since that year.

Heading into the Filoil Flying V Premier Cup championship match at the San Juan Arena, aside from all the flotsam of other people’s memories, I thought of two other things, oddly, an Ateneo-Letran match way back in 1987, and the first match of this year’s same Filoil tourney.

Now what does an Ateneo-Letran game over 20 years ago have to do with Ateneo-San Beda? Well, after both squads won their respective league titles in 1987 (Letran was led by Dong Libed and Jing Ruiz who is an assistant now to Leo Austria in Adamson), they met in the Reunion of Champions at the ULTRA. At that time, Ateneo and Letran was number one and two respectively in total NCAA hoops crowns and they had not met in a long time.

The game was over after a four minutes as the Blue Eagles dropped a 14-0 bomb on Letran. The Knights never got close.

When the current boys in blue and white opened their summer campaign, they faced off against the lads in red and white. The result was a heart-stopping win over San Beda in the final play with Kiefer Ravena and Greg Slaughter starring in the win.

Once more, this time in the final game of the summer, the two teams met and it’s for a title. Since the end of last season’s college wars, people have been trying to get the two to meet in a battle of champions. It never materialized for one reason or another. But I guess some things are fated to happen.

In a way, both squads weren’t whole. San Beda was missing Sudan Daniel and Anthony Semerad while Ateneo lost newbie Mark Tallo who went home disgusted after the lack of playing time. They were also tired having played several games over the past few days including a loss to NU in the semifinals of the Fr. Martin Cup the day before.

But no matter. They were here to play.

If you think the Blue Eagles played their best basketball against FEU in the semis, this time around, they played great on both sides of the court for the first time all summer.

After the first eight minutes of the game and the score at 21-6 in favor of Ateneo, I thought of the Ateneo-Letran game of long ago. Then-center Alex Araneta, Ateneo’s second-string center hit some huge shots in the early goings of the game before Letran sued for time. Cut to today, Kirk Long shadowed gunner Garvo Lanete enough to find out his deodorant brand and Greg Slaughter outmuscled Ola Adeogun inside. With outside-inside combo initially stopped, it was up to Dave Marcelo to get the Red Lions on the board.

He did but didn’t get much help. The cushion in the meantime was large enough to fend off the Bedan rally to come. After all, they had the weapons and talent to make it happen. But that first quarter was an incandescent one where almost every shot taken by Ateneo was in the flow. Everyone was in a zone offensively and defensively. That even caught Norman Black by surprise because they team felt flat in the last 15 minutes of the match against NU the day before. “We saved our energy for this,” he later quipped.

If there was anything that I thought would take the Blue Eagles out of their rhythm it was the bigs getting into foul trouble. Justin Chua picked up two quick ones and never returned. Ditto with Frank Golla, JP Erram, and Slaughter.

By the second quarter, SBC began to find their rhythm as Lanete and Adeogun, who reminds me of a young and raw Hakeem Olajuwon, chipped at the lead. And come halftime, they launched into a rousing rendition of the Indian Yell, perhaps the best yell in Philippine scholastic competition.

When the teams came out of their respective dugouts for the second half, the Red Lions had their game faces on. With their halftime show still ringing in their ears, the Bedans renewed their assault. After Dave Marcelo scored underneath, the score was 40-35.

When Slaughter went in for a two-handed stuff but was blocked from behind by Adeogun, the red army went nuts. Seated along the baseline. I looked at Greg’s face. He didn’t change his expression and instead ran back down on defense. I thought to myself, okay, he’s locked in and he’ll get back at Adeogun.

But it was Long who gave Ateneo breathing room when he nailed a triple at the apex of the rainbow for a 48-35 lead. I thought that Long struggled with his shooting throughout the summer and against the Tamaraws, it was his treys in the first quarter that propelled Ateneo to a lead they never surrendered.

Now that trey and two free throws later (after he got nailed by Lanete on the head ala Three Stooges out of frustration when Long poked the ball away for a turnover) put Ateneo up by 49-37. By third quarter’s end and the score at 54-41, I knew that the Blue Eagles had taken the best Red Lion chance of overhauling the deficit.

Looking at the Red Lions, I’ve seen them throttle teams en route to the finals. Now I could be wrong here but I think the missing pieces here (is not Sudan’s absence) are Rome de la Rosa and Kyle Pascual. Both have been turning up in a missing persons reports (sorry Coach Chot, I gotta borrow that).

In NCAA Season 86, I thought they were just as crucial to San Beda’s campaign. They turned in quality minutes and some great scoring sock. This summer, they’ve just not been there.

One guy who made an impact was Juami Tiongson. Gotta feel for the guy with all the hullaballoo about Ravena and Tallo coming in. Four point guards in the Blue Eagles lineup? I was beginning to worry that I might have to borrow La Salle coach Dindo Pumaren’s quip about his guard-laden team being a security guard agency. But Juami, the at-times forgotten Eagle, played great (apart from his eight-second backcourt violation). He made shots, was solid at QB, and he played great defense when Emman Monfort hobbled a bit. Juami had the second best stat line for the Eagles where he shot 50% from the field (4-8) and 100% from the line (4-4) while pulling down 5 boards and serving up 2 assists.

The best stat line, of course, was Greg’s. He scored 14 points, hauled – as in literally hauled them down over that crack Red Lions frontline of Adeogun, Marcelo, and Jake Pascual – down 11 boards to go with 2 assists and 1 block. That’s like a bucket for every two minutes on the floor so you know that his teammates are trying to work the ball over to him. When Greg rattled in that line drive from the right corner elbow with 3:18 left and Adeogun rushing out, I thought that was huge. About a minute later, he even hung in the air – is that possible -- to field a last second pass by Ravena and make an equally tough shot over the outstretched arms of Lanete for a 71-53 lead.

Those were back-to-back baskets that put away a tough foe.

As Pau Siarot made one free throw in a cameo appearance and JP Erram dribbled out the clock for a 75-56 victory, Ateneo’s first ever Filoil Flying V Premier Cup win was in the bag. Norman marveled at how his team was able to hold the offensive juggernaut that is San Beda. “They normally average 70-plus points a game. When you hold them to 56, that means you played great defense on them,” said the coach who has now won a championship in every Metro Manila-based tourney. There’s the PCCL, UAAP, Nike Summer League, the Uni-Games, and now the Filoil Flying V Premier Cup.

In case you have not been counting that’s a total of 12 trophies since 2007; the 12th title coming on the 12th day of June. The Blue Eagles began their summer campaign that seemed like eons ago against San Beda. And they closed out their pre-season games with a win over a tough and ancient foe. How’s that for perfect symmetry?

Oh, hey. He has 10 titles won in the PBA as well. And I do not know anyone coach with that kind of impressive haul (outside another Blue Eagle legend in Baby Dalupan who won 15 titles with Crispa, Great Taste Coffee, and Purefoods; 12 with UE; and 2 with Ateneo).

This title, of course, does not ease the pain on ’77 after all, we do not hang championship banners for tournaments outside the NCAA and UAAP. The old warhorses will continue to spin those yarns of three-peats and failed ones, of fights and rumbles, and of a great rivalry. But at least, we’ll have something to talk about. Until the UAAP Season 74 gets underway.

Coming out party for the Phenom

TJ Manotoc said it best: "This Phenom is FOR REAL"

I haven't seen a rookie dominate his debut game so well that he became the best player of the game with an amazing stat line: 25 points, 3 rebounds, 4 assists and 2 steals. He was so great that Greg Slaughter's performance was almost overshadowed.

Watch out UAAP. Barring any injury, this kid's going to be big! He is FOR REAL!

2011 FilOil Flying V Preseason Premier Cup schedule

A repost from inboundpass.com (by Christian Soler):

The 17 competing teams are split into two groups. Squads from the same group play each other in a round-robin format. The top four teams from each group advance to the crossover, knockout quarterfinal round. The semifinals and finals are also knockout affairs. All games will take place at the FilOil Flying V Arena in San Juan City

April 9, Saturday

1 pm: Opening Ceremonies
2 pm: *Ateneo vs San Beda
4 pm: *DLSU vs UST

April 13, Wednesday

1230 pm: EAC vs Letran
215 pm: San Beda vs Arellano
4 pm: NU vs UST

April 15, Friday

1230 pm: Mapúa vs CSB
215 pm: UP vs Letran
4 pm: UE vs JRU

April 16, Saturday

1230 pm: UST vs San Sebastian
215 pm: FEU vs Adamson
4 pm: NU vs San Beda

April 25, Monday

145 pm: UP vs FEU
330 pm: San Beda vs Lyceum
515 pm: Arellano vs DLSU

April 27, Wednesday

1230 pm: Adamson vs UE
215 pm: Lyceum vs Ateneo
4 pm: DLSU vs San Sebastian

April 29, Friday

1230 pm: Arellano vs NU
215 pm: FEU vs Mapúa
4 pm: JRU vs Letran

April 30, Saturday

1230 pm: UE vs EAC
215 pm: Adamson vs UP
4 pm: Ateneo vs UST

May 2, Monday

1230 pm: EAC vs FEU
215 pm: NU vs Lyceum
4 pm: CSB vs JRU

May 4, Wednesday

1230 pm: Arellano vs Ateneo
215 pm: Letran vs Adamson
4 pm: San Sebastian vs NU

May 6, Friday

1230 pm: Letran vs CSB
215 pm: Lyceum vs Arellano
4 pm: UP vs JRU

May 7, Saturday

1230 pm: EAC vs Adamson
215 pm: UE vs FEU
4 pm: Ateneo vs NU

May 11, Wednesday

145 pm: CSB vs Adamson
330 pm: JRU vs EAC
515 pm: San Sebastian vs Ateneo

May 13, Friday

130 pm: EAC vs UP
315 pm: Mapúa vs Letran

May 14, Saturday

1230 pm: UE vs CSB
215 pm: Lyceum vs San Sebastian
4 pm: FEU vs JRU

May 18, Wednesday

1230 pm: JRU vs Mapúa
215 pm: CSB vs EAC
4 pm: UE vs Letran

May 20, Friday

130 pm: CSB vs FEU
315 pm: Arellano vs San Sebastian

May 21, Saturday

1230 pm: UST vs Lyceum
215 pm: UP vs UE
4 pm: Adamson vs Mapúa

May 25, Wednesday

130 pm: Mapúa vs UE
315 pm: DLSU vs NU

May 27, Friday

130 pm: UP vs CSB
315 pm: Arellano vs UST

May 28, Saturday

1 pm: Mapúa vs EAC
3 pm: FEU vs Letran
5 pm: San Beda vs DLSU

June 1, Wednesday

1230 pm: UP vs Mapúa
215 pm: Lyceum vs DLSU
4 pm: San Sebastian vs San Beda

June 4, Saturday

2 pm: *San Beda vs UST
4 pm: *Ateneo vs DLSU

June 6, Monday

11 am: A2 vs B3
2 pm: *A1 vs B4
4 pm: *B1 vs A4
6 pm: B2 vs A3

June 8, Wednesday

2 pm: *A1/B4 vs B2/A3
4 pm: *B1/A4 vs A2/B3

June 12, Sunday

4 pm: *Finals

*- Game to be broadcasted live over Studio 23

March Madness Baby!

I'm no regular follower of US-NCAA basketball but man, I've been hearing a lot about the on going tourney and seems like it's one of the more exciting in years. So many close games and very few blowouts (which is a normal thing in tournaments like these). College basketball fans should be in a giddy! NBA scouts are all over the place as well! Exciting times for basketball as a sport. :)

I'm just hoping college basketball goes up to this level in the Philippines. I love the fact that UAAP and NCAA have become so popular that games are now televised LIVE. I remember the time when UAAP games were not televised and only championships were the only one's shown on TV - unfortunately, on delayed telecast!

With the rise of technology and social media these days, game information will forever be available. I remember following Ateneo games over twitter whenever I'm at work - shouting out when Ateneo held on for the win against FEU in the championship. Can't deny that college basketball right now is at it's peak but we need to realize that we're only focusing on the Manila teams and we don't have a "National Champion" - which the NCAA takes pride in unifying all leagues.

We do have the Champions' League (PCCL) and yeah, it has slowly grown to prominence - but I guess it will really take time for all these leagues to be aggregated into just one system. What's happening now is it becomes a "post-season" tournament where teams can strut their wares against opponents from other leagues and the title of "National Champion" doesn't have that attention just yet.

I hope a lot of time and funding can go into the PCCL. I want them to unify rules across all leagues so that when the tournament starts, we're all in the same page, footing etc.

I see Ateneo being the Duke counterpart of the NCAA. How about the other teams? What do you think?