LAST week I took a look at the underachieving De La Salle University (DLSU) Green Archers. This week it’s the ladies’ turn, the Lady Archers.
The Lady Archers came into this season with a new coach in former Green Archer Cholo Villanueva and new assistants in another former Green Archer and ex-Philippine Basketball Association player, JR Aquino and Vic Hapin.
I had the pleasure of working with Villanueva and Hapin in my last two years as team manager of the DLSU Graduate School Green Archers.
In both years with them, we got to the finals. We played in an inter-Graduate School league, where the participating teams were graduate schools of Ateneo, San Beda, University of Santo Tomas, Letran College and the Asian Institute of Management.
When Villanueva took over the women’s basketball program, I had no doubt that it was in good hands. Cholo didn’t have a lot of material to work with because he didn’t have time to recruit so he made do with what he had. The team had speed and a lot of unselfishness in the players. To offset their lack of ceiling and bulk, the Lady Archers rebounded and defended as a team with dizzying ball movement, which had everyone getting touches.
The team finished both the first and second rounds with identical 6-1 records to finish the eliminations at 12-2. Both losses were inflicted by the defending champion, the National University (NU) Lady Bulldogs.
While writing this piece, the Lady Archers fell, 62-50, to the Lady Eagles, who now move on to face NU in the finals. The Lady Archers had a twice-to-beat advantage over the Eagles, which the former squandered.
Prior to the DLSU-Ateneo best-of- three series, the Archers had narrowly beaten the Eagles twice during the elimination round but, perhaps, the so-called law of averages caught up with them.
Both playoff games saw defensive intensity going up several notches with both squads struggling offensively. Everything boiled down therefore to execution and Ateneo obviously had better execution.
In college sports, losses are tough, especially when one is passionate about one’s alma mater. The setback becomes even tougher when it involves two high character people one has worked with before.
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COACH Aldin Ayo has signed on to become the next head coach of DLSU for a reported P3 million for three years. Ayo recently worked wonders with the Letran Knights and led them to the National Collegiate Athletic Association title against the “six peat-seeking” San Beda Red Lions. Ayo brings to the table a helter-skelter, in-your-face type of defense and a run-and-gun offense.
Words like mayhem and house of havoc and chaos come to mind when you think of Ayo’s system. Ironically, Ayo’s system closely resembles that of the highly successful Franz Pumaren (who led the Archers to four consecutive championships, 1998-2001) who, like Ayo, puts a premium on strength and conditioning.
Ayo and Pumaren’s system brings to mind the Arkansas Razorbacks in the US NCAA. The Razorbacks had as their coach Nolan Richardson, who built up the team to give opponents “40 minutes of hell” on their way to winning the 1994 National Championship. It is the same system that Ayo hopes to put in place by the time UAAP season 79 kicks off in August 2016.
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BOXING aficionados like us are salivating at the thought of a fight between Mexico’s Canelo Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin. Alvarez is coming off a unanimous-decision victory over Puerto Rican boxing legend Miguel Cotto. Golovkin, on the other hand, knocked out David Lemieux in the eighth round.
One real obstacle to the dream fight is Alvarez can only fight at a catch weight of 155 pounds. Alvarez has to agree, within two weeks, to fight Golovkin, the mandatory challenger, or else the Mexican loses his belt.
World Boxing Council President Jose Sulaiman Jr. wants the fight to be held on Cinco de Mayo 2016. Both fighters have expressed their readiness to face each other.