MANILA, Philippines - After grinding out two close victories, Far Eastern U found itself in an unlikely spot atop the leaderboard of the UAAP Season 75 men’s basketball tournament.
“Both were close games. We could have easily been 0-2. We were just lucky,” Tamaraws mentor Bert Flores, whose wards rallied to beat University of Santo Tomas (73-72) then outlasted erstwhile leader La Salle in a low-scoring game (48-46) to start the season, said in Filipino.
Today, the Tams gun for their third straight triumph against Adamson (0-1) at 4 p.m. at the Smart Araneta Coliseum, hoping to somehow address the shortcomings that nearly led to their downfall in the first two outings.
“We still need to work on our rebounding; we were outrebounded by La Salle the last time (40-49). Arvie (Bringas) and (Russel) Escoto must step up in this department to help (Anthony) Hargrove, who was riddled with foul trouble in our second game,”said Flores, whose team stands half game ahead of defending champion Ateneo (2-1) and La Salle (2-1).
National University (1-1) hits the floor against University of the Philippines (0-1) at 2 p.m. intent on getting back on track in the tourney they were billed to be a contender in.
The Bulldogs kicked off their campaign with a masterful 90-55 trouncing of University of the East on opening day but got brought back down to earth by a numbing 65-89 beating at the hands of the Blue Eagles last Sunday.