Sports Eye
Troubled semis first game
By Jesus A. Garcia Jr.
“EXPECT the unexpected.”
The beautiful and colorful 2010 PRISAA-UCAAP Inter-Collegiate Basketball Championship was unexpectedly tarnished last Thursday when the semi-final match between traditional rivals University of Luzon Golden Tigers and University of Pangasinan-PHINMA Flames ended in a gaffe.
It was not the players who almost got into a fistfight, as we commonly see during close matches, but the coaches against the referees due to ineptness of two of the three whistle blowers. The tightly-contested match almost turned into a basket-brawl. Even the spectators, mostly women from different schools, jeered and howled at the two referees, Edward Soriano of Mangaldan and Ric Bautista of Calasiao, accusing them of biased officiating. They jeered the two chanting “Ma-sa-ol, ma-sa-ol! (Cheaters…cheaters…) each time they committed a bum call.
Even the table officials were erratic in scoring, which prompted the league’s top honcho, Atty. Gonzalo T. Duque, to howl: “Tangaw-tangaw kayo ed Pozorrubio.”
The fragile situation turned worse with seven seconds left in the game. UL was leading by three points, 89-86, when Flames assistant coach Renato Soriano, in disgust, kicked his team’s benches and accusingly pointed a finger at referee Soriano (no relation) that resulted in a technical foul against the Flames.
Coming over to the table officials to explain the infraction, coach Soriano suddenly picked up one of the monobloc chairs also in disgust to hit referee Soriano with. His players and some of the court officials managed to pacify him, but he was eventually thrown out of the court. Fuming, he left the court. This gave UL four free throws and all of them were converted by point-guard Jonathan Panunciar, enabling his squad to lead by seven points. The gaffe did not end there.
With UL inbounding the ball, Flames center Allan Roquin deliberately bumped UL slotman Larry John Balmes with thug force, six seconds left, and that almost caused pandemonium. Roquin earned a technical foul but Balmes missed the last two charity throws of the match.
The incident last Thursday reminded me of a series of incidents. In 2006, the head coach Angel Gumarang of UPang Webczars slammed plastic chairs due to the repeated bad calls by Bautista. After that unpleasant incident, Gumarang surmised that there were “unseen hands” controlling the league. He did not elaborate. In 2007, Gumarang was penalized with a one game suspension while Lyceum Northwestern University coach William Manaois on the same year was suspended for a year when he punched Dominic Pumar, a referee from Baguio City, after the skirmish not only due to bum calls but also because of uncalled for remarkds uttered by Pumar to Manaois.
Yes, what coach Soriano and player Roquin dtd last Thursday were violations of the rules and they should be reprimanded. But when bad officiating happens, you can’t blame the coaches and players if they get vexed and flare up. I hope we won’t see a repeat in the succeeding games, especially in the finals. The two erring referees should be sanctioned promptly and should not be tolerated. They certainly proved their worst in that game. I was told that the two are from BARECOM under the wings of their commissioner Manny Gatchalian. Hanggang porma lang sila.
Honestly, this year’s league scored a huge improvement if I compare it to the previous tourneys but inept court officials are ruining the good image of the league. What a shame.
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