Aldin Ayo: I’m very happy in UST
Aldin Ayo hasn’t had the best starts with University of Santo Tomas after his new team fell to a 1-4 record on Wednesday with a 99-72 loss to De La Salle in the UAAP Season 81 men’s basketball tournament.
The Growling Tigers are in a three-way tie with University of the East and National University at the eighth seed, but despite that Ayo said he perfectly happy being in UST.
“I appreciate the support of the UST community, the support of the managers, the priests, I wasn’t even aware that we would have t-shirts with my old jersey number on it,” said Ayo in Filipino at Mall of Asia Arena.
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“Even though this was the outcome against La Salle, I’m very happy here in UST.”
The Growling Tigers wore shirts that seemed to be in support of Ayo. It had the number four printed on the back, which was their coach’s jersey number while he was still playing at Colegio de San Juan de Letran.
“I told my players ‘guys I don’t know that people had this planned for me, this is not for me, this is for UST so let’s play for UST, let’s play for our alma mater,’” said Ayo, whose game against the Green Archers was his first since leaving La Salle, which his steered to a title in Season 79.
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The muscular head coach added that he doesn’t take credit for the improvements his former players had like Aljun Melecio and Justine Baltazar, two Green Archers who punished the Growling Tigers during their matchup.
Baltazar finished with a career-high 22 points with 10 rebounds, and three blocks while Melecio had 19 points and eight boards.
“The coaches should never take credit of the achievements of their players because the players themselves are the ones who worked on it,” said Ayo. “They’re the ones who practiced and trained and us coaches are just there to guide them.”
