Filoil Preseason Cup: UST Growling Tigers devour Mapua Cardinals

MANILA, Philippines—University of Santo Tomas jumped on to an early lead and never looked back to demolish hapless Mapua, 80-61, Wednesday night in the 2012 FilOil Flying V Preseason Hanes Cup at the Arena in San Juan.

Chiseled center Karim Abdul powered the Growling Tigers’ onslaught with 15 points and 15 rebounds.

“Slowly but surely you can see that the team is improving. Our play is getting better,” said UST head coach Pido Jarencio.

UST wasted little time as it got its groove on both ends and became more lethal as the game went on.

Aljon Mariano added 15 points while Kevin Ferrer hit 13 points and had eight rebounds.

Jeric Fortuna opened up the second half with a triple to bury the Cardinals deeper before back-breaking triples from streak shooter Clark Bautista widened the Tigers gap even more.

Bautista finished with 11 points, nine from downtown.

UST, which upped its slate to 2-3, led by as much as 23 as Mapua had a tough shooting night.

The Cardinals, who fell to 1-4, shot just 31% from the field and missed 24 out of their 51 attempts at the line.