What a rush! 

It was pure as pure could be: UP is the champion of UAAP Season 87 men’s basketball!

Exhibiting both depth and grit, it was an epic struggle between the two current titans of Philippine collegiate basketball: the University of the Philippines (UP) Fighting Maroons and the De La Salle University Green Archers. 

It was Game 3 on Dec. 15, and like any other evenly matched struggle, the contest was not decided until the final buzzer sounded.

All throughout, it was basagan ng mukha, balyahan and asawahan, to use street lingo to describe the very physical game that culminated the rivalry two years in the making. Players were wrestling on the floor for the ball, falling and grimacing in pain after absorbing wayward elbows and flailing arms, bouncing off full body charges, limping away, and cramping up.

It was not even supposed to reach Game 3. It should have ended with Game 2, but La Salle survived by a hairline 76-75 edge because UP was less steady down that stretch. Now, there was no room to slacken, no excuse to flinch. It was do or die.

As he did in Game 2, La Salle head coach Topex Robinson did not begin with his best player, power forward Kevin Quiambao, in order to have the two big guys Michael Phillips and Henry Agunanne start and establish inside dominance early on. While it worked in Game 2, the adjustment may have led to pulling out Quiambao and subsequently not being able to reinsert him early enough during Game 3’s fourth-quarter closing minutes when the game was still in the balance. Nevertheless, even when on court, Quiambao was often locked down by the UP defense and had few scoring opportunities.

Right after tipoff, UP cranked up its offense in an effort to put the game away early. Employing fast breaks that La Salle tried to counter with full court presses and traps, UP attempted to score quickly with every possession. The intensity was at its height when UP was able to build a 14-point lead in the third quarter, with Gerry Abadiano racking up 7 straight points. (It was Abadiano who could have won Game 2 when he took a last-second heave—that missed.) But then, led by Quiambao, La Salle’s 3-pointers started falling and Phillips scored at will, enabling La Salle to pull abreast at 56-56 early in the fourth quarter. That’s when the UP triumvirate of Quentin Millora-Brown, JD Cagulangan and Francis Lopez combined for 8 points to pull ahead and give UP the cushion it needed. Lopez’s final 3-pointer was the dagger to La Salle’s heart and his shot to full redemption after his 4 missed free throws and turnover that enabled La Salle to hang on in Game 2.

UP did not reach the level of success it now commands in men’s basketball overnight. It was not even years. It was decades. There was a time when UP was the cellar-dweller in the Universities Athletic Association of the Philippines. It was so bad that finally winning a game after 27 straight losses merited a bonfire at UP’s Sunken Garden, apparently because a single win was just as hard to come by as a championship. (Of course, there was a roaring bonfire at the Sunken Garden on Dec. 16.)

Now everyone is all praise and thankful for the support of alumni, sponsors, the school administration and the entire UP community to afford a basketball program that attracts top-notch coaching and nurtures talented players.

Over the past four seasons, UP won the championship in the first, placed a close second (losing in Game 3s) to Ateneo de Manila University and La Salle in the second and third, and claimed dominance once more in the fourth. Not bad in a league where UP is the only state university and all the others are the country’s top private universities. It is, hopefully, a dynasty in the making.

“Is it the players or the coach?” my wife said when I gleefully shared the news that UP had won. She was wondering who was responsible for the victory and was voicing the basketball version of the “Is it the chicken or the egg” question. “The players,” I said. Actually, “both” would have been a fair answer, but that would not have sat well with her, as she does not like me taking a noncommittal stance.

In a sporting world where the level of competition is so high that victory is determined by a split second or the “breaks of the game,” the way basketball is, the winning edge is often determined by mental toughness and the all-consuming desire to win. “Second is bottom. Second is last,” I vaguely remember some win-obsessed movie character saying.

UP’’s coach, the aptly named Goldwin Monteverde, underlined the importance of mental toughness when he told his team: “Walang bibitaw. Let’s not stop. Just keep pounding.” Game adjustments were no longer paramount. It was mindset. Clearly, it is true that the formula for success is “99% perspiration and 1% inspiration.” That 1% is the mental toughness that provides the winning edge. 

Put in the drills, the hard work, and they will all bear fruit. Or not. As the player executes, there is no time for thought. Hit or miss. Win or lose. Play ball!

Read more: UP admin and University Council still at odds on UP-AFP accord