UP Fighting Maroons’ Joel Cagulangan greets La Salle coaches after the game. UAAP PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines — Joel Cagulangan insisted his focus was to keep University of the Philippines within a step of the UAAP Season 84 men’s basketball tournament lead in facing his former team La Salle.
Cagulangan scored all his five points down the stretch, conspiring with Zavier Lucero as UP escaped La Salle with a thrilling 61-59 victory for its fifth consecutive win on Thursday at Mall of Asia Arena.
The former NCAA Juniors MVP out of La Salle Green Hills said his focus was not to haunt his former school, where he only played four games in 2019 and tallied a total of three points, 12 rebounds and three assists, before deciding to take his talent to Diliman a year after.
“Our goal is to finish 6-1 in the first round. It’s not because we were facing my former school La Salle.” said Cagulangan, who also had seven assists, five rebounds and two steals.
“Maybe there’s a little motivation but I already left the past behind. I’m happy because we got the win. Our coaching staff did a great job in preparing us for this game and my team played well especially in getting the offensive rebounds. We out-rebounded them offensively.”
Since getting a break after their opening day loss to Ateneo, the defensive point guard has been vital to UP’s five-game winning streak, where he averaged 5.2 points, 4.2 rebounds, 4.4 assists, 1.2 steals in 20 minutes.
Cagulangan said he is just giving back the trust of coach Goldwin Monteverde, who fielded him as the main point guard in the past five games.
“I’m just giving back to the trust given by coach Gold. It’s not easy since the team has a lot of prized recruits from high school. So I keep on working hard. I’m thankful for the trust and confidence of the coaching staff in my game,” he said.
Cagulangan tries to help UP in completing its goal to finish at 6-1 in the first round against Far Eastern University on Saturday.