BEHOLD, the Thomasian juggernaut has finally arrived.
Armed on the hardcourt with everything but the word “surrender,” the UST
Growling Tigers snatched the “heavyweight” tags right under the noses of the league’s top-billed squads to jumpstart their UAAP Final Four campaign on a bright note.
“The boys just showed them what the word ‘champion’ means,” coach Pido Jarencio told the Varsitarian. “I told them that as long as there’s still time, we must continue to fight,” he said in Filipino.
Already left for dead by the opposition, the Tigers heeded their feisty mentor’s coaxing as they needed only seven minutes and a dizzying 12-0 fourth-quarter rampage to finally break a seven-year, 16-game jinx against the De La Salle Green Archers in a classic 81-73 overtime heist last Aug. 11 at the Araneta Coliseum.
The roller-coaster victory fittingly erased the stigma of the Tigers’ first and last Archer setbacks, the former arresting UST’s 75-78 Game 3 finals nightmare on Sept. 30, 1999 that saw Dino Aldeguer rifle a four-point arrow straight into the hearts of the España-based crew with only two seconds left.
In this season’s first round, the Tigers dropped an 86-90 overtime loss to the Archers in their July 29 face-off, also at the Big Dome.
Anthony Espiritu, Dylan Ababou, Jun Cortez, and rookie Khasim Mirza, roused an erstwhile fainting UST squad back to life with a whirlwind offensive barrage in the final one minute and 57 seconds of regulation.
The versatile Espiritu-Ababou duo kicked UST’s fourth-quarter rush with a pair of freethrows each off the last two fouls of La Salle’s Ferdinand with 1:15 remaining, 61-69. Espiritu then punished La Salle further in the 49-second mark with a three-point play off Ty Tang, who had committed an offensive foul on the other end that led to Mirza’s top-of-the-arc killer trifecta, which narrowed the Archers’ lead by only a basket with just 40 seconds remaining.
That overtime-sending basket came from the guy whose record the Archers failed to take into account: Cortez – the 2001 UAAP juniors MVP – who launched a dagger off a jumper from the side with 6.7 seconds left that knotted the count at 69-all.
With Mirza chalking up eight of his team-high 16 points in overtime, the Tigers outscored the Archers, 12-4, in the extra session to ice the game.
Season 70 MVP frontrunner Jervy Cruz backstopped Mirza with another double-double effort of 16 points and 18 rebounds on top of a league-best seven blocks, while Ababou and Espiritu added 15 and 14, respectively.
Rookie sensation
In another fierce encounter with last year’s finals prey, the Tigers feasted on the Ateneo de Manila Blue Eagles anew, 87-74, last Aug. 4 at the Cuneta Astrodome, thanks to the phenomenal Mirza’s back-breaking 6-of-7 heave from three-point country that sparked a telling 18-0 fourth-quarter surge for the defending champions
Mirza fired a game-high 25 points, including 12 in the final canto where the Tigers ripped a 62-63 deficit wide, three minutes gone by the fourth. The prolific Cruz, meanwhile, chipped in 19 markers and 21 boards.
“Nagsisimula nang lumabas ang totoong laro ng mga bata. One by one, everyone is stepping up in each game,” Jarencio said. “We haven’t reached our peak yet, but we are almost there.”
Winning streak
Rebounding from a dismal two-game slump early in the first round, the Tigers nailed three consecutive victories to stay on the right track.
UST clawed the National University (NU) Bulldogs, 83-72, last July 26 at the Araneta Coliseum. Ababou took the offensive cue from the defense-hobbled Cruz as he went three-of-four from the arc to finish with a team-high 18 points.
Prior to manhandling NU, UST found another outside bomber in Franciz Allera, who averaged 20.5 points in their 76-68 and 96-84 thumping of the University of the Philippines Fighting Maroons last July 22 and the Adamson Univesity Falcons last July 19 at the Ninoy Aquino Stadium.
Clearly distracted by the sudden exit of main man Jojo Duncill two weeks before the UAAP wars unfurled, the Tigers groped for form in search of a crunchtime leader, as they bowed to the rookie-laden Far Eastern University Tamaraws, 66-81, last July 14 and the unbeaten University of the East Red Warriors, 60-73, last July 8.
UST now touts a 5-3 win-loss card. With reports from Paul Nicholas P. Dimerin
