Wildcats defeat Jaguars; clinch first win in 2019 Cesafi Partner’s Cup

CIT-U forward Mark Kong gets triple-teamed by USJ-R. / Photo by Jonas Panerio

CEBU CITY, Philippines – The Tough Gear-Cebu Institute of Technology-University Wildcats notched their first win of the 2019 Cesafi Partner’s Cup after they destroyed the University of San Jose-Recoletos Jaguars, 89-77, on Saturday, June 29, 2019, at the Cebu Coliseum.

CIT-U was up by two, 34-32, at halftime but blew the game wide open in the third, which they kicked off by scoring 13 unanswered points capped off by a difficult three-point play by point guard Karl Ventura.

The Wildcats were relentless and ended the third with a 12-5 blast with rookie forward Didoy Proel scoring seven during that stretch to push the team to a 69-46 lead heading to the fourth.

USJ-R tried to rally in the final canto but couldn’t get the lead down to single digits to hand CIT-U its first win in seven games.

Five different players scored in double-figures for the team of head coach Edsel Vallena led by the 19 points of Jesse Aloro and the 15 of Ventura.

Proel and Jemcerson Sable had 14 points each while Mark Kong put up 11. Miguel Gastador led the way for USJ-R with 20 points while foreign student-athlete, Arnold Azangue, had 17.

In the high school division, the USJ-R Baby Jaguars clobbered the Cebu Elite-University of San Carlos Baby Warriors, 74-64, to tally its fourth win against a single loss.

Diether Go paced USJ-R with 19 points while Kevin Guibao contributed 18. /dcb