Leading Bulldogs eye playoff momentum, battle Tamaraws
National University coach Jeff Napa knows what the Bulldogs need to do to enter the Final Four with a huge momentum boost—rid themselves of roadblocks and let everything flow from there.
Far Eastern University is just one of those obstacles.
“We have to be ready in this last stretch of the second round,” Napa said, immediately after National U’s playoff-clinching win over Adamson in the UAAP Season 88 men’s basketball tournament at UST Quadricentennial Pavilion on Saturday.
“They have to show their best performances all the way, so at least, somehow, [their] goal [becomes] reachable bit by bit.”
NU will not take FEU lightly in a Wednesday showdown scheduled at Mall of Asia Arena, not even if both schools are on different zip codes in the standings.
The Bulldogs, at 9-2 (win-loss) and on top of the heap, are supposed to be heavy favorites against the 4-6 Tamaraws.
But a hungry squad is a dangerous squad. And that is what FEU is right now.
“We put ourselves in the situation where if we continue to play good basketball, we’ll be in the conversation,” coach Sean Chambers said recently.
“It’s been an amazing season and I’m happy that we’re able to put ourselves in this kind of conversation this late in the season,” he added.
UST vs UE
FEU has the opportunity to add noise to that talk by leapfrogging the squads above them: Adamson (5-6), Ateneo (5-5) and University of Santo Tomas (5-5).
And that’s where the Tamaraws’ hunger will come from, a craving sharpened by an opportunity for payback after losing to the Bulldogs in the first round.
And that first-round duel was hardly a competition—NU routed FEU, 84-68.
Omar John and Jake Figueroa joined forces that day to finish with 16 and 13 points, respectively.
The guard tandem of Janrey Pasaol and Jorrick Bautista, on the other hand, dropped 16 and 15 points, but that wasn’t enough to even keep things close with the Bulldogs.
Things are expected to be closer when both squads collide anew, with urgency peaking for both squads.
The Tigers, meanwhile, hope that the comforts of home and an opponent with nothing left to play for will make things easy as they seek to snap out of a slum that laid to waste a brilliant start to the tournament.
After starting the season on a 4-0 card, UST, which battles winless University of the East in the other game, has now lost five of its last six games.
