Jared Brown responded in the biggest of ways after his disastrous game against De La Salle University last Saturday.
Brown, a 5-foot-10 point guard, made sure to atone for his off-game with a brilliant performance against Adamson University with his Ateneo de Manila University’s life in the UAAP Season 86 Men’s Basketball Tournament on the line.
The transferee out of Westmont College in California produced 20 points on 4-of-7 shooting from beyond the arc while also securing four rebounds, dishing out four assists, and getting one steal.
More importantly, he set the tone in the first half with 14 points as the Blue Eagles led from start to finish, booting out the Soaring Falcons, 70-48 on Wednesday at the SM Mall of Asia Arena.
“I didn’t really have a good shooting game last game so I made sure I needed to get those today, luckily they went in,” said Brown, who had some family who flew in from California to support him and Ateneo.
Against the Green Archers, the 23-year-old marksman was put in clamps, being limited to just three points on a measly 1-of-12 shooting from the field, missing all but one of his eight shots from deep. He still managed to get six assists, three steals, and two rebounds but committed two turnovers.
He credited the coaching staff for devising a great game plan and his teammates for putting him at the right spots, making him drill those long bombs with ease.
“Our coaches have been preaching the game plan and just following what they would say and I think today we really followed it to a tee and we executed what they wanted,” said Brown.
“I think I was just getting the shots, my teammates were just finding me at the right spots and it was my job to just knock them down.”
However, head coach Tab Baldwin said it was not luck that gave Brown a good shooting game today.
The decorated mentor praised the work ethic of his new guard, calling him a great addition to the team in terms of shooting.
“Jared just takes opportunities as they arise and he said luckily his shots fell, that’s not a lot of luck, the kid works extremely hard on his shot, he brought a very good shot to the program and he works hard on it every day,” said Baldwin.
“Happy for him. He’s a very humble guy and he gives credit to his teammates as he should. But at the end of the day, he’s got to knock the shot down and today he got looks and he was able to knock them down.”
After surviving this knockout match, the Blue Eagles will march to another win-or-go-home affair, trying to topple a twice-to-beat UP Fighting Maroons on Saturday at the SMART Araneta Coliseum.
For Brown, the team should have the same mentality against UP.
“Today’s game was kinda good we have momentum coming into Saturday,” he said.
“All we have to do Saturday, our preparation for that is just to follow what the coaches want us to do and execute it as perfectly as we can, we’ll be fine.”
