The defending CESAFI champions, the Southwestern University (SWU) Cobras, finally grabbed their first win in the 2015 FilOil Flying V Hanes Premiere Cup tournament in a 73-60 thrashing of the University of the Philippines (UP) Fighting Maroons Wednesday afternoon at the FilOil Flying V Arena in San Juan City.
The Fighting Maroons originally had eight players suit up for the team as majority of the team’s players had finals this day. Paolo Romero, Paul Desiderio, and Lionel Tekoudjou later arrived in the arena and were fielded in the game.
Both teams displayed dismal offense in the first quarter as both UP and SWU struggled to convert on their shots. The 17-year old rookie from Congo, Boko Mupungo scored the team’s first eight points to give the Cobras an 8-7 lead. A putback by Jarell Lim with 2:55 remaining was the only field goal UP converted on the rest of the way in the quarter. A nifty layup by Mac Tallo and a three pointer by Harold Habagat gave SWU a 13-9 lead to end the first quarter.
John Auditor had the hot hand in the second quarter in scoring 10 points that broke the game wide open. With the SWU lead going down to just four points, 21-17 with 5:09 remaining, the SWU lead would balloon to as high 32-20 to end the quarter. UP was limited to just 22% shooting by SWU and were outrebounded 36 to 24 during halftime.
The Cobras never looked back as they sustained the double-digit lead for the entire during of the game behind the troika of Mupungo, Auditor, and Tallo.
Mupungo had a huge double-double with 22 points and 18 rebounds while Auditor had 16 points and seven rebounds. For UP, four Fighting Maroons had double figures in scoring with Gelo Vito, Paul Desiderio, Diego Dario, and Jarell Lim scoring 13, 12, 11, and 11 respectively.
SWU limited UP to just 28% shooting. Moreover, SWU had 16 second chance points coming from their 22 offensive rebounds that proved to be the biggest factor in SWU’s win.
SWU will next face UE on Friday, May 29 at 5:00pm while UP plays the same opponent on Wednesday, June 30 at 11:30am.
The Scores:
SWU 73 – Mupuungu 22, Auditor 16, Tallo 10, Goloran 6, Parker 4, Holper 4, Bregondo 3, Acuno 3, Habagat 3, Luz 2, Pardo 0
UP 60 – Vito 13, Desiderio 12, Dario 11, Lim 11, Jaboneta 5, Webb 3, Longa 3, Prado 2, Gallarza 0, Romero 0, Tekoudjou 0
| TEAMS | 1ST | 2ND | 3RD | 4TH |
| SWU (B, 1-2) | 13 | 32 | 52 | 73 |
| UP (B, 1-6) | 9 | 20 | 40 | 60 |
