For the past two UAAP seasons, De La Salle University has yet to beat its archrival Ateneo de Manila University on the court.
It has been almost five years since La Salle has beaten Ateneo. Meanwhile, the Blue Eagles have stretched their dominance to six consecutive victories over the Green Archers.
For La Salle’s mentor Derrick Pumaren, seeing this current batch of Green Archers fold in the second half in their 57-74 loss to the Blue Eagles in round one of the UAAP Season 84 Men’s Basketball Tournament was plain torture.
Both sides were essentially even until Ange Kouame capped off a 2-13 rampage. That then set the defending champions on their way.
“Kind of frustrating the way we played no,” queried the former Sunkist coach. “I think we made a lot of mistakes out there. We did not execute the things we were doing offensively and we just gave up.
“We just gave up. That’s the way I see it. “
Michael Phillips was arguably La Salle’s only bright spot of the game as he led the Green Archers with 13 points and 10 rebounds. There were a lot of disappointing moments during the game like some of those turnovers that could have been so easily avoided and those rushed shots when La Salle was behind 41-42 in the third quarter.
It is losses like these that test the character of a rebuilding team’s development. While there are still 10 more elimination round matches to go, this one is probably going to sting for a while considering that after a long time, La Salle looked like it can face Ateneo on an equal footing.
“We told them that we didn’t really execute well tonight – we were running away from what we should be doing. We didn’t run the offense or the pattern we should be running out there. There were a lot of forced shots. We had no discipline offensively that’s why I think we lost the ballgame. Ateneo really played good defense,” said Pumaren.
“Part of it is because of poor execution. That’s why we ended up shooting bad shots, shooting forced shots. We were doing things away from what we were supposed to do offensively and that’s why we shot pretty badly.
“Masama ang shooting namin. I can say that it’s because of our execution. We didn’t really execute. It was more of a lot of forced shots,” lamented Pumaren.
But in a schedule so compressed, bouncing back is as easy as waking up the next day.
And on Tuesday, the resilience of this batch of Green Archers will be tested when they face the suddenly-surging University of Santo Tomas Growling Tigers.
“But the most important thing is how we bounce back on Tuesday.
“Just gotta learn from the mistakes today. We just have to go back to the drawing board. Tomorrow is practice and then we’ll be ready for our next game on Tuesday,” he said.
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