Ekwe’s shooting keys NCAA champ Beda's win vs Letran

From GMANews.TV

MANILA, Philippines – A Sam Ekwe who can shoot is an unstoppable Sam Ekwe.

San Beda got off to a hot start then cooled off Letran’s late-game rally to win, 71-67, in the men’s basketball tournament of the National Collegiate Athletic Association Wednesday at the Astrodome.

And from start to finish, Ekwe had a lion’s share of the spotlight.

The former league Most Valuable Player dumped 16 of his 25 points in a first half that saw San Beda play true to a defending champion’s form.

The Lions posted their biggest lead at 19 points in the third before the Knights clawed their way back and chopped the deficit to 68-64 with 59.4 seconds left in the game.

Then Ekwe put the finishing touch in a most un-Ekwe-like way. He buried a 17-footer off a drive and draw with point-guard Pong Escobal to pad the lead to 70-64, a cushion that was enough to hold off Letran.

“We’re under pressure to win this game," Ekwe said. “We didn’t dwell on our mistakes in our past two gamers, and luckily we came out with this win."

The Letran faithful may have thought luck had something to do with Ekwe’s outside shots.

It used to be defense and rebounding—and not shooting—that was Ekwe’s bread and butter. But on a night where his 17 rebounds and four blocks were givens, Ekwe’s noticeably improved perimeter game was the difference-maker in the two teams’ first meeting since the Lions swept the Knights in two games in the finals last year.

“We needed this win to be able to have a good position coming into the second round," said San Beda coach Frankie Lim.

Rookie Jake Pascual finished with 12 points and seven rebounds, and Ogie Menor and Borgie Hermida chipped in 10 each for San Beda which improved to 5-2 and tied Jose Rizal University for second and third places.

Letran’s RJ Jazul, the tournament’s top scorer, was out of sync. Of his 18 attempts from the field, 12 came from three-point territory. He missed 11 of those 12 attempts. Overall, he was five-of-18 from the floor.

Dino Daa and Rey Guevarra, who were expected to support Jazul, finished with seven and four points respectively for the Knights who lost for the first time after winning six straight.

“We didn’t start strong and we played soft inside the paint," Letran coach Louie Alas said, “We were beaten black and blue [in] rebounding and then we allowed Ekwe to hit those shots."

The victory seemed to have injected some life back into the defending champions who were still smarting from the NCAA’s decision to forfeit their game versus Saint Benilde. Prior to that, San Beda lost to JRU.

“This win was a statement game for us," Lim said. “We lost two games in one night, and that’s not very good. I told my team to look at the bigger picture because everything happens for a reason." – Erickson Beco