The vaunted defense was there but the offense was wanting. The leads delivered but the supporting cast was missing. Blue Eagles vital cogs Chris Tiu, Severino Baclao and Eric Salamat were stopped, but Rabah Al-Hussaini was simply unstoppable.
The Green Archers lost Game One of the Finals but all is not lost.
The defending champions failed to grab the go ahead victory in the series opener of the classic Ateneo-La Salle UAAP Championship at the jampacked Araneta Coliseum last Sunday with a 69-61 loss to the Blue Eagles.
While JV Casio finally got his groove against the Blue Eagles, scoring a team-high of 20 points, it was not enough to overpower the Rabah-Al Hussaini assault on the Green Archers. This season’s top contender for the Most Valuable Player award scored 31 big points, almost half of the Ateneo output.
The Green Archers controlled the rhythm of the ballgame …
Green Archers lose Game 1
How Important is Game One?
(Writer’s Note: All record references are from 1994, the year the UAAP began to adopt the Final Four format)
In a few hours, we will all be witness to the historic 3rd UAAP finals confrontation between bitter rivals, the Ateneo Blue Eagles and the De La Salle Green Archers, since the Final Four format was implemented. The rivals are even in their record in the Finals against each other. The Green Archers won over the Blue Eagles in 2001, while the latter exacted revenge over the former in 2002. It will take only two victories to earn the championship, which makes the first win an-all important one. And by Sunday night, we will all know who has drawn first blood. But how important is it to take the first game? At this point, let me adopt the famous (or infamous) style of the controversial Philippine Star columnist Quinito Henson.
Since the Final Four format was implemented in the UAAP in 1994, the team who won Game 1 went on to win the championship, in 10 out of the 14 seasons (1994-2007). Interestingly, half of those ten times were courtesy of De La Salle (’98, ’00, ’01, ’04 and …
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Tale of the Tape: Eagles vs. Archers
As they say, all records are thrown away and all stats are disregarded, whenever the Ateneo Blue Eagles and this year’s defending champions, the De La Salle Green Archers play against each other. Winning is a matter of school pride. Numbers are forgotten.
Nonetheless, the stats are still important for the teams’ respective tacticians to plot the right offensive attack and to design the proper defensive stance. Six-time UAAP Champion coach Franz Pumaren and his 1989 Philippine Basketball Association Grandslam Coach, Norman Black, are both cerebral coaches and will definitely rely on the figures to devise the strategy for Sunday. Is outrebounding the key to victory? The stats will provide a clue. Will the bench play a significant role in claiming the win? Again, the stats may tell. We present to you the comparative statistics of the Ateneo Blue Eagles and the De La Salle Green Archers for the entire elimination round of UAAP Season 71 (taken from the Season 71 Senior Elimination Round Statistical Summary):
We also view the head-on stats of the two teams, based on their meetings last July 6 (1st round) and September 6 (2nd round). Did the team step up or slow down against their rivals? Let’s see.
Elimination Round Stats…
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Mangahas stars as Green Archers goes to the Finals
The FEU Tamaraws thought stopping JV Casio meant stopping De La Salle. But they forgot about James Mangahas, and they paid dearly for that.
The three-year veteran forward scored 20 big points, including the final seven points of the Green Archers, and became the latest hero for De La Salle as the defending champions barges into the Finals of Season 71 of the UAAP Men’s Basketball Tournament.
With the Tamaraws ahead by one-point, 62-61, less than a minute left in the game, Mangahas converted on a Simon Atkins assist and completed a crucial three-point play, to put the Green Archers on top by 2 points, 64-62, 35 seconds left in the game clock.
FEU’s Mac Baracael had a chance to tie the ballgame anew after he was fouled by Rico Maierhofer but the FEU forward, who averages 71.4% from the free throw line, missed both charity baskets. Mangahas was fouled anew and split his charity baskets to give the Green Archers a safer three-point margin, 65-62
Trying to keep FEU’s finals hopes alive, Paul Sanga threw a three-point shooter, which bounced off the rim and Mangahas grabbed the all-important …
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Rico, JV on track for back to-back UAAP Mythical Team slot.
Green Archers Rico Maierhofer and JV Casio retained their Mythical Team slot for UAAP Season 71 after garnering 61.5000 and 60.8571 total statistical points (TOTSPs), good for a fourth place and fifth place finish, respectively.
They will contend with last season’s Most Valuable Player awardee Jervy Cruz of UST (75.0714 TOTSPs) and Ateneo’s Rabe Al-Hussaini (71.1429 TOTSPs) and Chris Tiu (62.1429 TOTSPs) for the highest individual honors.
Rounding up the top ten in the overall statistical points are Edwin Asoro of the NU Bulldogs, Severino Baclao of Ateneo, Dylan Ababou of UST, Mark Barroca of the FEU Tamaraws and Marcy Arellano of the UE Red Warriors:
Among the rookies, Ateneo’s Ryan Buenafe leads the pack with 36.5000 TOTSPs with DLSU’s Maui Villanueva and LA Revilla running second and third with 32.1429 and 26.9231 TOTSPs, respectively.
The following are …
