Games today:
2 p.m. – Letran vs San Beda
4 p.m. – USC vs FEU
Cesafi champs trample UAAP runner-up UST
The University of San Carlos (USC) Warriors continued on their Cinderella-run through the 2015 National Collegiate Championship (NCC) as they booted out UAAP runners-up, University of Santo Tomas (UST) Growling Tigers, 82-72, yesterday to advance to the Round-of-Four today at the Arena in San Juan.
Shooster Olago of USC grabs a rebound in this Cesafi finals game against UV last October at the Cebu Coliseum. Olago led the Warriors to victory over UST yesterday in San Juan City.
The Warriors took advantage of what appeared to be an uninterested Growling Tigers squad to move on to the next round, where they will face off against the UAAP champions Far Eastern University (FEU) Tamaraws.
That match will be played today at 4 p.m. with the winner moving on to the winner-take-all championship match.
Cameroonian Shooster Olago, the man responsible for propelling the Warriors to their first Cesafi title in 57 years, once again came up big as he finished with 19 points, 15 rebounds and three blocked shots. He also anchored USC’s breakaway late in the game when UST threatened at 61-67 after a driving layup by star forward Kevin Ferrer.
First, the athletic 6-foot-7 forward followed up his own miss and tipped it back in to push the lead back to eight.
Then, after Gio Laguyo sliced through UST’s defense for a daring layup, Olago scored seven straight – a layup, an and-one off a crafty spin move in the post and two freethrows – to give the Warriors a 78-63 lead.
UST tried to rally and pulled to within eight, 71-79, after two triples from big man Kent Lao but Christian Maconocido and Olago canned their freethrows down the stretch to secure the victory.
The other Round-of-Four match will see a rematch of the NCAA finals as the San Beda Red Lions take on the Letran Knights.
The Red Lions booked their spot after trouncing the Technological Institute of the Philippines Engineers, 79-77.
Robert Bolick and Donald Tankoua had 13 each for San Beda, Dan Sara added 12 while Davion Potts and former University of Cebu import Arnaud Noah chipped in 11 each.