THE DE La Salle Green Archers on Wednesday gave their former coach a thorough beating, picking apart his new team, the UST Growling Tigers, 99-72, at the Mall of Asia Arena.
With the 27-point rout of UST, La Salle improved to a 3-2 win-loss card while the Tigers slipped to a 1-4 slate with their third-straight loss.
Highly regarded coach Aldin Ayo had led the Green Archers to a UAAP title in 2016 before moving to UST to guide a young team.
The Green Archers never looked back after Santi Santillan’s free throw in the second frame ended a 17-6 blitz.
“I think naging factor ang youth kasi puro bata ang nasa game and hindi lumalabas ang laro nila. Kung iko-compare ko practices namin, ang layo,” Ayo said in an interview.
La Salle had a slim 4-2 lead early in the opening frame before they exploded with a 17-7 run, topped by Santillan’s put-back, 21–9.
The Green Archers converted 13 easy points off UST’s 14 turnovers. The Green Archers also crushed the Tigers in bench points, 40-29.
Justine Baltazar led all scorers with 22 points and 10 rebounds while Aljun Melecio added 19 markers.
Renzo Subido led UST with 16 points while Marvin Lee and Zach Huang added 13 markers apiece.
Steve Akomo did not suit up for the Tigers due to food poisoning.
UST will try to bounce back against the University of the East Red Warriors on Oct. 6, Saturday, 12 p.m., at the Smart Araneta Coliseum. I.R.L. Suing
That phenomenon of having good practices that does not translate to equally good games has been bugging the tigers for 3 years now. I do hope my comment reaches Coach Ayo or any of his staff because it has been a recurring problem for the last 3 years. It maybe their youth or maybe not yet very cohesive. But i think Coach Ayo should start intervening with the “good practice, bad game phenomenon”. It has become psychological. I hope you dont mind my input Coach Ayo. I sincerely hope you remedy this while its early. Goodluck.