INQUIRER Sports

SLOWLY BUT SURELY, FAR EASTern University is fast becoming the biggest threat to defending champion Ateneo in the 72nd edition of the Universities Athletic Association of the Philippines men?s basketball tournament.

Why did I say that?

In last Thursday?s UAAP game at the Big Dome, the FEU Tamaraws, playing with newfound confidence, made mincemeat of the UST Growling Tigers, 90-63, to nail their fifth straight win in six games and earn a share of the lead with the Ateneo Blue Eagles?the only team which has beaten them so far.

(FEU and Ateneo played separate teams yesterday, with the Tamaraws battling the UE Warriors and the Blue Eagles clashing with their arch rivals, the La Salle Green Archers.)

A pre-tournament favorite, FEU started like a house on fire against UST, stormed to a 47-25 bubble at the half and never looked back.

Three members of the national developmental pool?battle-tested Mark Barroca, JR Cawaling and Aldrech Ramos?and tall and tireless rookie Hippolyte Noundou from Cameroon, spearheaded the fired-up Tamaraws.

?Our tight defense did it,? said victorious coach Glenn Capacio, an FEU Hall of Famer.

?We stayed focused on Dylan (Ababou) and Khasim Mirza, UST?s top-rated shooters, and that paid off.?

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FEU last won the UAAP cage championship in 2005. Coached by Bert Flores, the key players were Arwind Santos, Dennis Miranda and Mark Isip, who have all moved to the professional Philippine Basketball Association.

Alongside UST and UE, FEU is the winningest school in UAAP?s basketball history with 18 titles tucked under its belt. FEU won the first UAAP basketball title in 1938.

FEU also contributed several basketball players to the Olympic Games, namely Edgardo ?Ding? Fulgencio, Manuel ?Manolet? Araneta and Andy de la Cruz (1948 London), Meliton Santos and Jose Gochangco (1952 Helsinki), Gerry Cruz (1960 Rome) and Arturo Valenzona, Engracio ?Boy? Arazas and Manny Jocson (1964 pre-Olympics in Yokohama, Japan).

In the Asian Games, where the Philippines was perennial cage champion in the early 1950s and late 60s, FEU was ably represented by Santos, De la Cruz and Gochangco (1951 New Delhi), Bayani Amador (1954 Manila), Gerry Cruz, Boy Arazas, Manny Jocson and Joselino Roa (1962 Jakarta), Jocson (1970 Bangkok) and former PBA MVP Johnny Abarrientos (1998 Bangkok).

And in the ABC Championship (now Fiba Asia), FEU contributed Cruz, Arazas and Jocson (1963 Taiwan) and Jocson and Arazas (1965 Kuala Lumpur).

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During my student days at FEU, the campus heartthrob was Herminio ?Togay? Astorga, who shone in both the NCAA and UAAP tournaments in the 1950s.

Born on Dec. 22, 1929 into poverty?his father was a driver in Barugo, Leyte, while his mother was a vegetable vendor at the San Andres public market in Malate?Astorga learned the basics of basketball in improvised one-goal courts on sandlots in Malate?s crowded district.

His early cage career promised nothing lofty.

But by dint of hard and honest work and a strong faith in God, Astorga was able to succeed in life, becoming a Manila councilor and vice mayor in the 1960s, a university professor, Catholic lay leader and entrepreneur.

An all-around player (center, forward and guard), Astorga was a well-built, 5-foot-10-? cager?then considered a rarity among Filipino basketball players at that time.

He finished high school at Letran and graduated with a BSC degree in economics at FEU, both on a basketball scholarship.

Astorga succumbed to cerebral hemorrhage on Jan. 19, 2004 in New Jersey at the age of 74.