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| UP had the Archers on the ropes, until the Greenies carved their way back into the game. (image by Joseph Nebrida/Inboundpass.com) |
DLSU Green Archers over the UP Fighting
Maroons, 73-72
This game
can make for a good case study on this oft-repeated sports adage: keeping a
lead is harder than building one.
Even if the
lead is 20 points.
Oh, UP, what
is to be done with you?
The Maroons
fought their way to a 20-point bubble mid first half, exploiting DLSU’s shaky
backcourt play with German efficiency on the way to several
points-off-turnovers. Pao Romero shook his head in delight as he shot two
straight lefty runners that found the bottom of the net to erect the Diliman
quintet’s biggest lead, 33-13.
And then
UP’s luck ran out, and La Salle, finding themselves backed into a corner and on
the verge of another shattered Final Four dream, slowly jabbed and parried,
closing the gap inch by painful inch.
The Archers
ended the 1st half on a 10-2 spurt that gave them a semblance of a
chance, and they didn’t let that chance go to waste in the final 20 minutes.
The Greenies eventually snatched the lead near the end of the 3rd
canto on Almond Vosotros’s floater, but Mike Gamboa, waxing hot in this one,
beat the buzzer from rainbow country to retake the advantage entering the final
stanza, 50-48.
Both teams
traded punches and barbs in the last quarter, but the difference was La Salle’s
execution. The Archers utilized superior team play to neutralize the spirited
individual efforts of UP’s Mike Silungan and Miggy Maniego in the clutch.
Vosotros combined with Luigi dela Paz and LA Revilla to secure just enough
breathing room and pull off the back-from-the-grave win, and, in the process,
retain a sliver of hope at a playoff for the final Final Four slot.
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| LA Revilla's heady play in crunchtime helped pilot La Salle's roaring comeback. (image by Joseph Nebrida/Inboundpass.com) |
It won’t be
easy for the Taft five, however, as they’ll have to hurdle both their remaining
assignments – the also-ran NU Bulldogs on Thursday and the on-the-rise FEU
Tamraws on Sunday. If the Archers lose just one of those games, then the long,
hard look at what went wrong this season begins. If they win both, though, and
provided UST loses all its remaining contests, then a playoff is in the cards.
On the other
hand, what’s in the cards for UP is another shot at solving the riddle that has
riddled their program for a long time – what can make the team better? They
have talent. They have good, experienced coaching. They have a good young core.
Is it alumni support? Is it better recruiting? Whatever it is, it’ll be another
round of soul-searching. That much is for sure.
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| Mike Silungan covers his frustration as the Fighting Maroons lose another heartbreaker. (image by Joseph Nebrida/Inboundpass.com) |
DLSU 73 – Torres 15, Vosotros 12,
Revilla 11, dela Paz 8, Van Opstal 7, Tampus 5, Villanueva 4, Atkins 4, Paredes
4, Sara 2, Marata 1, Mendoza 0, Gotladera 0
UP 72 – Silungan 19, Maniego 14, Romero
12, Gamboa 12, Montecastro 6, Juruena 5, Manuel 2, Gomez 2, Mbah 0, Gingerich
0, Pascual 0
QS: 7-23, 23-35, 48-50, 73-72
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