Archers, Tigers seek third straight win vs cellar dwellers

Games today (Smart Araneta Coliseum)

2 p.m. – UP vs UST

4 p.m. – DLSU vs AdU

MANILA, Philippines - Defending champion La Salle and last year’s runner-up University of Santo Tomas seek their third straight victories against the cellar-dwellers as they try to close in on the lead pack today in the UAAP Season 77 men’s basketball tournament at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.

The Green Archers have rediscovered their winning ways after a 0-2 start, hurdling their last two assignments to climb to the middle of the standings and they should have little problem in the 4 p.m. setto against an Adamson side (0-4) reeling from an embarrassing 25-62 setback to National U last Wednesday.

Though on a two-game roll after dropping their opening assignment, the Tigers (2-1) went through a wringer in a scary 50-49 verdict over the lowly Falcons last week – something opponent University of the Philippines (0-4) can draw inspiration from in their 2 p.m. encounter.

DLSU coach Juno Sauler‘s wards have been on bit of a struggle, too. With starting point guard Thomas Torres sidelined by foot injury, the Archers’ backcourt found it hard to adjust, as shown in their come-from-behind 60-58 win over University of the East last Wednesday. The Archers committed a whopping 36 turnovers against the pressing defense of UE and Sauler said they were “lucky to pull through” despite the miscues.

“We’re having a problem, not only Almond (Vosotros) but even Kib (Montalbo) at the point. When Kib’s out, Almond had to play point and sometimes Robert (Bolick) and Jeron (Teng) so the absence of Thomas (affects our backcourt),” said Sauler.

He even cracked a joke that had Torres played, “it would have been 35, instead of 36 turnovers.”

If there’s some positives in the “ugly” win, it’s that the Archers have shown tehir champion’s pride and unraveled a new hero in rookie Prince Rivero, who stepped up when Jason Perkins and Arnold van Opstal fouled out.

“Here in the UAAP, every win is important. We got the win and now we’ll have to work on whatever (concerns) we see in the clips (and address them),” said Teng.

Adamson is looking to move on after that harrowing showing against NU. The Falcons shot a measly nine-of-57 shooting (one of which was a result of a goal-tending violation) and the 25-point tally was the lowest in the modern era.

“It’s a bad shooting day,” said AdU coach Kenneth Duremdes, who also owned up for the blowout loss. “We were executing our plays. Siguro, ‘yung confidence noong mga players, when they started missing their open shots, pati ‘yung depensa naapektuhan (The players’ confidence dropped when they failed to make their shots and with it, everything else, including the defense, went south).”

Duremdes is not losing faith on his young wards and he encouraged them to continue striving.

“Hopefully, we don’t repeat the same situation again. I’m hoping that with this loss, we have to respond well. It’s back to the drawing board again,” he said.

“We know that La Salle is a very, very strong team. Again, we just have to play. We have to play to our capabilities right now, kung ano ang makakaya namin (give out our best effort). Doon pa rin kami and we will stick with our program,” added ‘Captain Marbel.”

Also looking to put up a better showing are the Tigers, who had to claw back from a nine-point deficit and lean on a split freethrow by Kent Lao with 1.1 second left to survive the Falcons.

“Lack of focus,” rued UST center Karim Abdul. “I think we have the potential to be among the top teams. I guess we just have to focus.”

Tigers coach Bong dela Cruz said overconfidence nearly did them in against AdU so he told his charges not to commit the same mistake against the Maroons.

“As a veteran team, that shouldn’t be the attitude (going against a supposedly lowly team),” he said.