LNU trims AIE-C in OT
CENTER Leonel Manalo proved to be the hero of defending champion Lyceum Northwestern University (LNU) Dukes in their battle against AIE-College Blue Stallions for the first game of the 2010 PRISAA-UCAAP Inter-Collegiate Basketball Championship quarterfinals held Monday at the Dagupan People’s Astrodome.
Manalo converted a forced three-point fade away shot with only two seconds left in regulation time to tie the score, 80-80.
He then went on to score eight of his team’s 20 points in the extra period, powering them to a 100-96 victory.
The Dukes playing with less intensity in the first three quarters, found themselves in trouble in the final quarter, trailing by four points, 77-73, in the dying seconds and three in the last four ticks. The lowly rated Blue Stallions unleashed a bomb beyond the arc that stunned the crowd, forcing head coach Jason Vinluan to call a timeout.
The timeout paid off with Manalo assigned to make the three-point shot.
“We learned a big lesson in this game and it should not be repeated,’ said Vinluan.
SECOND GAME
In the second game of the day, the University of Luzon Golden Tigers got a little scare from their opponent PAMMA Blue Dragons, whom they defeated for the first time with just a single digit score difference, 67-58.
The Tigers, with their boss Dagupan City dad Chito Samson in the crowd, forced a deadlock in the first quarter, 15-15, and slowly but surely crept in the second and third quarters to lead by 16 points before finally finishing off their enemy.
Point-guard Jonathan Panunciar did most of the damage, scoring a total of 17 points, six of them in the last 58 minutes. Forward Harold Deocares helped with a 12-point mark.
Despite their victory, head coach Renato Vidal was not satisfied about the performance of his dribblers. “The over-confidence of my boys annoyed me…this should not happen either with a weak or a strong opponent,” he said.
In the third and last game, University of Pangasinan-PHINMA Flames proved that their first victory over Colegio de Dagupan Blue Stallions on July 30 by two points, 81-79, was not a fluke by beating anew their foe, but with a bigger margin this time, 84-74.
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