Adamson University Soaring Falcons head coach Franz Pumaren apparently does not want to dwell on the departure of student-athletes Tyrus Hill and Kurt Loreja to rival school De La Salle University Green Archers anymore.
Pumaren was reached for comments Tuesday after Akari-Adamson’s match with Che’lu-San Sebastian Revellers in the 2018 D-League Aspirants Cup semifinals, but declined to respond.
“You ask them,” said the 54-year-old tactician.
The two Filipino-Americans, according to a report broken by Tiebreaker Times last April 7, have already been in Taft before the news came out as per the social media posts of some La Salle players.
It was somehow a return for Hill and Lojera as La Salle was the first school that initially recruited them.
Pumaren doesn’t want to discuss such issue anymore as his focus is on the task at hand, which is helping the Falcons in their current campaign in the developmental league.
Akari-Adamson is now down 0-1 in the best-of-three semis series after absorbing a 70-60 defeat to the Revellers, which were led by veterans Cedrick Ablaza and Jeff Viernes.
“We’re a little bit sluggish. We’re a little bit rusty,” rued Pumaren, as his team came from a 12-day break due to earning an outright semifinals berth. “But of course that’s not an excuse.
“I think that they really played terrible.”
Still, Pumaren saw some positives in the defeat. And he addressed that they only need to be more consistent with the way they play especially on Thursday’s Game Two — a do-or-die situation for them.
“In spite of us playing terrible, in spite of us playing bad, I think we were there in the game,” said the multi-time UAAP champion coach.
“We just have to be more consistent in our game.”
