University of Santo Tomas avoided disaster to notch its second win in the UAAP Season 89 men’s basketball, beating University of the East, 98-87, at Mall of Asia Arena on Wednesday.
The Growling Tigers led by as much as 23 points before the Red Warriors made it interesting and threatened to pull off a comeback in the fourth quarter.
Fortunately for coach Pido Jarencio, his team had all the answers to keep UE at bay and winless after four games.
‘They (UE) know how to play. They might be 0-3 but they have a new coach and the players want to show out so in the second half they got some momentum,’ Jarencio said in Filipino.
‘At least we were steady in the end to get the win. That was our story. As long as we get that W, it doesn’t matter by how much, as long as we win.’
Trailing by 10, the pesky Red Warriors unleashed a 7-3 rally capped off by a triple from Toper Lagat to slice the lead to six, 86-80, with 5:24 remaining.
Mark Llemit called a ceasefire and sank a jumper to halt UE’s run and extend UST’s advantage to 88-80 with under five minutes to go.
The Red Warriors continued to fight, even slashing the deficit again to six, 89-83, before Llemit shut the door on UE with a triple to put the Tigers up, 92-83, with 2:39 left in the game.
Llemit ended up with a season-high 22 points that went with seven rebounds, three assists, a steal and a block for UST, which improved to 2-1. Amiel Acido scored 16 while Collins Akowe tallied a double-double of 14 points and 11 rebounds.
Lagat led UE, which crashed to 0-4 even under a new coach, with 22 points, while Mo Tanedo and Cole Cruz-Dumont added 16 and 12, respectively.