General Admission
To beat Ateneo is to beat a champ’s heart
By Al S. Mendoza
WHEN I was asked on Wednesday which team would win, I never had any second thought.
“Ateneo,” I said.
Why Ateneo?
“Because Ateneo is easily the superior team,” I said. “University of the East is nothing but a flash in the pan. It’s like the weather: It rains this minute, it brightens up the next.”
But I wish UE would win.
“Go ahead, wish UE to win,” I said. “But there’s a world of difference between wishing one to win and seeing that team to win.”
Before Ateneo routed UE, 71-58, on Thursday for the title, I could not see a clear reason why Ateneo would win.
True, UE routed Ateneo in Game 2, 88-68, to forge a winner-take-all encounter.
But that was just one battle.
A war consists of several battles.
That one battle was when UE shone the brightest.
Every person, every team, has its own singular moment worth remembering.
Game 2 was that moment for such guys like Elmer Espiritu and Pari Llagas, UE’s behemoths whose combined explosion surprised even their mothers.
Oh, yes, include Lawrence Chongson, the idealistic UE greenhorn with the flying locks whose run-and-gun, razzle-dazzle style of coaching had its summit in Game 2.
In short, while everything fell apart for Ateneo in Game 2 after a brilliant victory in Game 1, for UE, it was the opposite.
In Game 2, everything fell into place for the Red Warriors that their stunning brand of game seemed suddenly fit for NBA play.
So flawless was UE in the second game of the playoffs that it was even ready that night to clinch an Olympic berth for the Philippines in the 2012 London Olympiad.
When asked what happened to the Blue Eagles in Game 2, Ateneo coach Norman Black said, matter-of-factly, “It was just one game.”
How true.
One game is one game is one game.
The true measure of having the heart of a champion is looking beyond one game, scouring the totality of the overall picture, bowing to the encompassing nature of a war.
The UAAP championship is a war that is not won in a single game.
When all the marbles are finally at stake, that’s when the real meaning of fulfilling a mission comes in.
Ateneo does that aspect best that is why it won the UAAP basketball crown two years in a row.
A champ’s heart is the hardest to defeat.
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