By Michael Angelo S. Murillo, Senior Reporter

HISTORY beckons for the Ateneo Blue Eagles when they trek back to the court today in Season 82 of the University Athletic Association of the Philippines as a win completes for them a season sweep of men’s basketball, something not seen in the league for nearly three decades.

Up 1-0 in their best-of-three finals series over the University of Santo Tomas Growling Tigers, the Katipunan-based Eagles go for the title-clincher in Game Two scheduled at 4 p.m. at the Mall of Asia Arena that would earn for them a perfect season.

In the event Ateneo completes a sweep, it becomes only the fourth team in UAAP history to achieve such feat, joining the University of the East (1969 and 1970), Far Eastern University (1976, 1980 and 1981) and UST (1993).

The Eagles put themselves on the verge of an unblemished season with a dominant performance in the finals series-opener on Nov. 16, beating the Tigers, 91-77.

Despite a break of two weeks after sweeping the elimination round and rendering the semifinals a step-ladder, Ateneo returned hardly showing any rust, crisp in its attack on both ends to manhandle UST.

Ateneo took a 32-17 lead at the end of the opening quarter before it hit a rough patch early in the second frame.

But once it got its collective footing back it sprinted away and never looked back the rest of the way.

Graduating player Thirdy Ravena set the tone for the Eagles from the get-go en route to finishing with 32 points, five rebounds and three assists.

Ange Kouame had solid all-around numbers of 18 points, 12 rebounds and five assists, with SJ Belangel scoring 12 points, all coming from beyond the arc, to go along with five dimes, four boards and two steals for Ateneo.

“Well, it’s good to get the win obviously. But we tend to not really see that as a win. We see that as the first half of basketball and we just get a long halftime break. We get to prepare for the second half, which will be in your eyes, Game Two,” said Ateneo coach Tab Baldwin as they gear up for Game Two today.

“We just want to be 1-0 from here. We don’t really care what’s going on in the past. We have one game left [to win]… Believe me, we just want to play this game on Wednesday well, play it really well. Win the game and whatever comes with that, comes with that. We don’t want our focus on anything else. Especially any talk about records or anything like that. Let’s just play this game on Wednesday and do the best we can,” the Ateneo coach added.

BOUNCE BACK
For UST, the game plan is to win the game, extend the series and pull the rug from under Ateneo in a sudden death.

Coach Aldin Ayo said they will try to come out more prepared in Game Two and bounce back from a “bad” outing last time around.

“We played bad, really bad. We were not executing. Some players did not play their usual game. But I think the problem was the coaching staff. I think we were not able to prepare them well,” said Mr. Ayo following Game One.

“I told the players that we just have to handle this loss the right way; that means going back to our videos and see where we need to improve. We have to correct them. We have three days to prepare for Wednesday,” he added.

In Game One, rookie Mark Nonoy paced UST with 26 points with Brent Paraiso and Soulemane Chabi Yo adding 14 and 13 points, respectively.

Meanwhile, prior to the start of Game Two, the season individual awards will be handed out.

Among those to receive awards are UST’s Chabi Yo as league most valuable player and Nonoy as rookie of the year.

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