Figuring in a tight game against Chinese amateur club DK Basketball Team, the University of Santo Tomas Growling Tigers leaned on Mark Nonoy to pick up an 82-74 win, Saturday evening in the opening round of the NBA 5v5 Grand Finals in Shanghai.
Nonoy, an incoming rookie, scored 10 of his 21 points in the final frame. He also tallied six steals.
Nonoy provided the spark in an 11-3 UST rally that turned a 63-all deadlock into a 74-66 cushion with 59 seconds left.
DK tried to muster one last rally but a big basket by Soulemane Chabi-Yo and free throws from Nonoy and Renzo Subido sealed the win.
Chabi-Yo anchored UST’s defense with 20 points, nine rebounds, and three blocks while Rhenz Abando chipped in 10 markers.
In his first sanctioned game, CJ Cansino had seven points and seven rebounds in 10 minutes of game time.
Gluing all these together for UST was Brent Paraiso, who dished out nine assists to go along with nine points.
Point guard Hou Yong paced DK with 21 points while big man Dwayne Brown had 16 points and 10 rebounds.
UST will next face Dispatch in the semis of this tournament that has RMB 500,000 as top prize for the Grand Champion on Sunday, August 18 at 3:30 pm.
The Scores:
UST 82 – Nonoy 21, Chabi Yo 20, Abando 10, Paraiso 9, Cansino 7, Subido 7, Huang 6, Caunan 2, Bataller 0, Cuajao 0.
DK 74 – Hou 21, Liu 17, Brown 16, He 9, Zhang 5, Gu 4, Chen 2.
Quarterscores: 15-18, 30-38, 53-55, 82-74.
