Centeno, Biado lead 4-gold haul

Cheska Centeno and Rubilen Amit of the Philippines celebrate after winning gold and silver medals, respectively, in the women’s 9-ball singles event of the 29th Southeast Asian Games billiards competition Sunday at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Center. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO/SEA GAMES MEDIA POOL

KUALA LUMPUR—Carlo Biado and Chezka Centeno swept billiards’ 9-ball singles finals, taekwondo jin Samuel Morrison prevailed in what could be his farewell Southeast Asian Games fight and Filipino-Japanese teen Mariya Takahashi rocked the judo competition as Team Philippines raised its gold-medal haul to 22 on Sunday.

The 18-year-old Centeno kept her title with a 7-6 decision over two-time world champion Rubilen Amit at KLCC Hall 4.

Biado then plucked the men’s gold—the country’s fourth for the day—over Duong Quoc Hoang of Vietnam, 9-5.

“I know that I have all the breaks and that boosted my confidence” said the 33-year-old Biado, also a gold medalist in the recent World Games in Poland.

As of 9:30 p.m. Sunday, the Philippines remained mired in sixth place with 22 golds, 28 silvers and 55 bronzes, three days left before the Games end.

At nearby Hall 1, Samuel Morrison used his late grandmother as inspiration to score a 28-18 win over Dinggo Ard Prayogo of Indonesia, in the -74 kilogram division final.

That somehow eased the grief of SEA Games rookie Arven Alcantara losing the -68 kg gold.

Alcantara settled for silver as hometown bet Rozaimi bin Rozali was ruled the winner by “punitive declaration” with the scores deadlocked at 17-all.

The head judge ruled that the Filipino jin had accumulated 10 gamjeoms (penalties) and was disqualified, although the Philippine camp insisted that Alcantara had only nine as indicated on the electronic scoreboard.

With 13 seconds left in the third and final round, Alcantara rallied from 13-16 down with a kick to the Malaysian’s head, worth four points, but was penalized for slipping, leading to the 17-all deadlock.

Had the judge allowed the match to proceed, both jins would have gone on to sudden-death, with the first to score a point taking the gold.

Takahashi, 16, also stole the thunder from four-time champion Surattana Thongsri of Thailand via ippon in the first 43 seconds of their women’s -70kg event.

Olympian Michael Martinez, meanwhile, settled for second place in the men’s individual free skating event after crashing in the middle of his routine.

Martinez scored a total of 171.63 points, paving the way for Malaysian Julian Zhi-Jie Yee (205.43) to claim the gold. Another Malaysian, Khai Xiang Chew (145.52), bagged bronze.

The Philippines finished with 29 golds medals each during the 2013 Myanmar and 2015 Singapore SEA Games.