UNIVERSITY of the Philippines rolled to another win, but this victory left a lot to be desired.
Boosted by a key second quarter run, the Fighting Maroons whipped the Far Eastern University Tamaraws 69-58 yesterday for their fourth straight win in the 87th UAAP basketball tournament at the Mall of Asia Arena in Pasay.
UP took its biggest lead at 69-44 on two straight baskets by Denzil Walker and Reyland Torres with four minutes to go but FEU closed the tiff with a 14-0 binge led by Adam Nakai.
“One thing that coach Goldwin (Monteverde) would always remind the players is iyong consistency namin so consistency in a game would apply to all four quarters. So, in many ways, this was similar to our game against UE,” Maroons assistant coach Christian Luanzon said. “Hindi lang maybe worse than that but you know, after how we started especially in the first (quarter) I would say 25 minutes, the last 15 minutes medyo nag-relax kami.
“I guess the quarter scoring says it all, you know, our offense only produced 14 points and then allowed them to score 21 which was their highest in the game in the fourth quarter. So that’s something that we’ll definitely look into,” he added.
LeBron Lopez showed the way for UP with 13 points and four rebounds while one-and-done Millora-had a double-double of 11 markers and 13 boards.
The win served as a fitting follow-up to the Maroons’ 89-62 drubbing of the National University Bulldogs last Wednesday and stayed unscathed with a 4-0 mark.
The Tams, coming off a painful 51-56 loss to the University of the East five days ago, remained winless with a 0-4 slate.
“We’ve just been trying to get better every day. All of us know we have more to reach for. It’s still early, this is only the fourth game, and we have a lot more to achieve this season,” the 6-foot-9 Millora-Brown, who graduated from The Citadel in the United States, said.
The Katipunan-based crew went on a 15-3 blitz that gave it a 39-22 edge at the half.
UP was still in command 55-37 going into the final 10 minutes.
Nakai finished with 12 points, 10 in the final minutes, for FEU while Jorick Bautista added 11 markers.
Veejay Pre also had 10 points for the Tams.
