The Phenom cometh

He had many detractors since he first stepped in senior play. “He will get posted up by the bigger guards,”they said. “He’s The Phantom,” one prominent Green fan blurted in his blog after he laid an egg in his first seniors game. “He gets shots because of the attention on (Nico) Salva and (Greg) Slaughter,” most basketball fans probably muttered under their breaths.

He was one of the best high school players to ever come out. He dueled with Baser “The Hammer” Amer from Mendiola, who is a close buddy, for the title of being the best high school recruit two years ago. Since then, they’ve had different degrees of success. Both have tasted a championship. But only one has become The Man for his team as of now.

Where Kiefer Ravena goes, so do the Blue Eagles.

It wasn’t an overnight takeover. It happened in-game. In a heart-stopping encounter with none other than their most hated rivals. Here he was and his team, staring at an 11-point deficit, staring at a near decider match where they play for all the marbles. If you had a twice-to-beat advantage, saying “there’s the next game” is the sign of a loser, always looking for escapes, goats to blame on. But not for him. “We just had to suck it up.”

He just had to suck it up.

It was time to prove to everyone that “The Phenom” is for real and not just a title.

With his 7-foot slotman being buried underneath a pile of rugged defenders draped in green and white, the homegrown talent from the backyard of Loyola knew it was time. And David Webb’s antics couldn’t have been more timely.

Here was a player who barely got his butt off the pine trying to egg on the King Eagle. And mind you, people, especially from the Blue side, haven’t had any sweet affection for this guy who plays as if he is royalty on the court. There he was trying to be a jester as the King held his court. And that’s when everything clicked.

Webb was supposed to be a game-changing talent according to one Green fan. He lambasted the Eagles’ recruits such as Nico Salva, who he said would not be able to do scrat. And of course, that snide “Phantom” remark. I have not forgotten those. I have that tacked on my board in case I needed it for reference. Well, Phantom it is…but Phantom of your nightmare more likely.

Kiefer took off on a solid 12-0 run by himself, scattering 16 points, six boards and four assists in the second half of a languid fourth quarter for Ateneo. They had just scored seven points in a woebegone third canto. And the King Eagle just could not take things sitting down from his eyerie.

In just two minutes, Ravena poured in three crippling triples before setting up the back breaker from Ryan Buenafe as Almond Vosotros tried to get his team’s mojo back. People, me included, said that if Kiefer just got a very consistent jumpshot, then his career would only get better. Well lookie here, was that a consistent jumper or not?

It was a sizzling-hot performance. Clutch in its very definition.

Rising up to the occasion, that’s what stern men are made of. That’s what superstars do.

It was winning time, and Kiefer Ravena just broke loose.

It was winning time, and the King Eagle swooped down on his foes and swept the field of battle.

A career-high 28 points, 12 rebounds – for a guard his size – and seven assists. A mammoth game from a mammoth talent.

The King Eagle has officially claimed his Archer Killer medal.

The King Eagle has taken up his mantle in the eyerie of Loyola.

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