UST Growling Tigers’ Mo Tounkara in the UAAP Season 87 men’s basketball tournament. –MARLO CUETO/INQUIRER.net
MANILA, Philippines — After University of Santo Tomas failed to sustain its strong start, Mo Tounkara vows to continue working harder to regain the momentum for the Growling Tigers in the UAAP Season 87 men’s basketball tournament.
Tounkara brought out his A-game with a near-perfect 21-point game on 9-of-10 shooting and grabbed five rebounds but UST absorbed an 81-70 loss to unbeaten leader UP Fighting Mroons on Wednesday at Smart Araneta Coliseum.
The Malian student-athlete, who went up against UP bigs Quentin Millora-Brown and Dikachi Ududo, said he relishes the chance to rise to the occasion for the Growling Tigers, especially against the top teams.
SCHEDULE: UAAP Season 87 basketball
“It’s just basketball. I was excited about the game. I just put all my effort in there,” Tounkara told reporters. “We’re just trying to get better every day. We have practice. We’re going to film the game and try to correct our mistakes and prepare for the second round for sure.”
The 6-foot-7 center’s impressive showing didn’t result in wins as UST had strong starts against defending champion La Salle on Sunday and led the first half against UP but ended up with a two-game skid and slid to joint fifth place with a 3-3 record.
“I think against La Salle and UP since they’re the top two teams. We had a good game against both of them. But against La Salle, we lost on the rebounding and today, turnovers also,” said Tounkara. “We’re going to try to build something today and prepare more for the second round. The second round is going to be fun for sure.”
“I think we had a bad third quarter [against UP]. We didn’t start our third quarter very well. I think that’s the main point. And we had a couple of turnovers also, that we weren’t able to come back from the game,” he added as UST gave up 24 turnovers.
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Tounkara, who assured all is well after tweaking his ankle in the second half, promises to work on his rebounding, especially when they wrap up the second round against Far Eastern University, which has one of the league’s rebounding leaders Mo Konateh.
“I’m going to work on it. The rebounding is more about desire and techniques. But I think I really need to work on my rebounding, both defensively and offensively,” he said.
“We’re going to still improve our rebounding and control our turnovers also. Mo is a good player. I really appreciate the way he plays the game. It’s going to be exciting to play against him. I think FEU is a pretty good team also.”