Blue Eagles take Game 1 in crushing fashion

 

Ateneo ripped that notion to shreds.

 

Turning Game 1 into a personal playpen, the rampaging Blue Eagles pulverized the Far Eastern U Tamaraws, 72-49, to draw first blood in the UAAP men’s basketball championship in front of a boisterous crowd of almost 17,000 Saturday at the Araneta Coliseum.

 

The Blue Eagles marked the Finals as their territory early on, storming out of the gates with a scorching offense and a suffocating defense that held FEU’s top gunners into sub-par performances.

 

At the end of the first quarter, the defending champions were up, 26-8 and the Tamaraws were left to choke on dust the rest of the way.

 

“This has been a champion team for the last couple of years and we knew once we got there that it’s sort of our home ground,” said American guard Kirk Long, who paced Ateneo’s balanced charge with 14 points on top of five rebounds and a couple of steals.

 

“We have the experience in the Finals. We came out with a lot of intensity and we took it from the get-go. Even if they’re the No. 1 team, we felt like it’s our crown to defend. It’s ours and they have to take it away from us.”

 

The Eagles thus moved within a win of capturing their third straight championship—a first in the school’s history.

 

The 23-point blowout was the most lopsided Finals game since the La Salle Green Archers walloped also the Tamaraws by 25 points, 72-47 in Game 1 of the 1998 Finals.

 

“We did a good job of preparing for the game,” said coach Norman Black after his Eagles downed the error-prone Tamaraws for the first time this season in front of a crowd of 16,834.

 

“We recognize our weaknesses against this team. We had to rebound the basketball well, we had to play good perimeter defense, and we did a good job today. On the other side, we did what we wanted to do offensively, we got out and ran.”

 

The Eagles shot 47.5 percent from the field, while holding down the Tamaraws—the league’s top offensive team averaging 75.4 points—to a woeful 27 percent.

 

“This is probably our best game of the year but hopefully we’ll play a better one [in Game 2] on Thursday,” said Black, whose  Eagles also had 18 assists, while the Tamaraws could only muster half of it.

 

“We were like a deer caught in the headlights and couldn’t recover,” said FEU athletic director Mark Molina, who spoke in behalf of the Tamaraws after the game.

 

“The entire team couldn’t put it together. We’re embarrassed. We let everyone [in our school] down. They just executed 10 times better that we did. Part of it was experience, part of it was preparation. That was the difference.” 

 

Game 2 of the title series is at 4 p.m. on Thursday also at the Big Dome, right after the awarding of individual honors at 3 p.m.
 
Earlier, Adamson’s Anna Buendia and Gretchie Roque came out firing right in the opening quarter as the Lady Falcons trounced the FEU Lady Tamaraws, 75-69, in Game 1 of the other title series in women’s action.

 

Buendia and Roque teamed up for 17 of the the Lady Falcons’ first 22 points as the defending champions built a 41-30 halftime lead and held off the Lady Tamaraws’ fourth-quarter rally.

 

“We focused too much on offense and our defense collapsed in the fourth quarter,” said Vega. “Good thing Buendia and our other players stepped up.”

 

Buendia unloaded 28 points and grabbed nine rebounds, while Roque drilled 10 of her 22 points in the first period.

 

Seniors MVP RR Garcia, who averaged a league-best 16.8 points, had only five points to show in the first half before finishing with a team-high 11.

 

Rookie of the Year Terrence Romeo shot 10 points, but made just a bucket in the first two quarters.

 

“Coach Norman just reminded us not to relax at halftime because we have a tendency to relax when we have the lead,” said veteran big man Justin Chua of the Eagles, who lost to the Tamaraws by a total margin of five points in two elimination games.

 

The Blue Eagles played minus backup center Jumbo Escueta, who served a one-game suspension after incurring two unsportsmanlike fouls this season.

 

But the back-to-back titlists hardly felt his absence as seldom-used rookie JP Erram ably filled his spot by recording five of Ateneo’s six blocks.

 

Chua buried 13 points and Nico Salva finished a rebounds shy of a double-double with 10 markers and nine boards to help the Eagles pull away by as many as 26 points, 47-21, at the start of the third quarter. Photo by Mark Giongco

 

The scores:
First Game (Women’s)
ADAMSON 75—Buendia 28, Roque 22, Almazan 9, Sandel 8, Ortega 6, Mangahas 2, Penarada 0, Bernardo 0. 
FEU 69—Lim 17, Palmera 13, Positos 12, Borja 12, Columna 7, Sicat 6, Soriano 2, Yazon 0, Supnet 0, Cabochan 0. 
Quarters: 22-8, 41-30, 54-44, 75-69
Second Game (Srs)
ATENEO 72—Long 14, Chua 13, Salva 10, Monfort 9, Austria 8, Salamat 8, Erram 4, Gonzaga 2, Golla 2, Buenafe 2, Tiongson 0, Dela Cruz 0. 
FEU 49—Garcia 11, Romeo 10, Cervantes 7, Noundou 6, Ramos 6, Cawaling 3, Exciminiano 2, Cruz 2, Bringas 2, Guerrero 0, Mendoza 0, Knuttel 0, Sanga 0.
Quarters: 26-8, 42-21, 60-38, 72-49