Ateneo coach Tab Baldwin vs UST. UAAP PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines — Ateneo coach Tab Baldwin is hoping that the Blue Eagles’ 50-point annihilation of University of Santo Tomas is “a sign of better things to come'”in the UAAP Season 84 men’s basketball tournament.
Ateneo played like a well-oiled wrecking machine, blasting UST with a 101-51 victory to remain unbeaten in 10 games on Thursday at Mall of Asia Arena.
Baldwin stressed it can be considered a statement win for the Blue Eagles if they can sustain it in their remaining games.
“I think that’s a grand thought to have and I would like for that to be true,” said Baldwin after their blowout win. “But I think that we’ll only know whether that’s true or not if we follow it up with other games where the players really keep their shoulders to the grindstone and keep working hard right throughout the game and stick together and work with one another.”
“I hope this is a sign of better things to come for our team. But we’ll have to wait and see,” he added.
Ateneo, who has yet to lose after 36 games since 2018, has already clinched a Final Four slot.
Baldwin wanted to see a 40-minute performance from the Blue Eagles and it resulted in their most dominant performance of the season so far, where they led by as many as 53 points and held the Growling Tigers to 20-of-70 shooting and 2-of-25 from deep.
“Apart from a little bit loose with the ball 19 turnovers, I think that it was a pretty comprehensive performance on both ends of the floor and feels good to everybody when I think you walk off the floor feeling like you played 40 minutes of basketball as a team,” he said. “That’s really our job. So we feel pretty good about that.”
Raffy Verano, who led Ateneo’s win with 18 points and seven rebounds, also said Blue Eagles have to address their mental lapses amid their unbeaten run.
“I think we just need to mentally prepare ourselves for each game. Coach Tab, the coaches have been harping on that, we have a lot of mental lapses, especially in the second half,” Verano said. “We’re talking within the players, mentally we need to come to the game with a killer instinct. I think today, we actually showed a little bit of that. I think moving forward, it’ll just keep going up and up.”
The defending champion has four more games remaining in the eliminations, facing National University on Saturday. A sweep would book the Blue Eagles an outright finals ticket for the second straight season.