Blue Eagles make country proud
Jude P. Roque
Ateneo de Manila University’s men’s basketball varsity squad—the Blue Eagles—represented the Philippines in the 40th William Jones Cup tournament in Taipei and did not disappoint. It was the first time the country sent a college team in this annual international tournament, which initially raised eyebrows. The Philippines is usually represented by the national men’s team or a professional squad bolstered by foreign imports. For the record, the country has won five Jones Cup titles, the last in 2016 by the import-laden Mighty Sports squad that swept the tournament. Two other foreign player-reinforced Philippine teams won this tournament previously—Northern Cement in 1981, and San Miguel Beer (with Chip Engelland, Jeff Moore and Dennis Still) in 1985. The Philippine men’s national team also did the trick twice—in 1998 by the Tim Cone-led Centennial team and in 2012 by Gilas 2.0 of coach Chot Reyes. Earlier this year, defending NCAA champions San Beda Red Lions also represented the country in another major international joust—the Dubai International Basketball Championship—but failed to notch a single win in four outings versus top caliber and import-reinforced professional teams in West Asia.
The original plan was to send the “23 for 2023” Gilas Cadet squad to Taipei but most of its players have commitments with their school teams. The Blue Eagles were fresh from winning the 2018 Fil Oil Cup pre-season tournament via sweep and welcomed the thought of testing the international waters of the Jones Cup. After all, Ateneo head coach Tab Baldwin is no stranger to the Jones Cup after having previously coached the Jordanian National Team and Gilas Pilipinas in the same tournament before. In 2015, he led Gilas to a second-place finish there.
Although we expected the Blue Eagles to compete well in the Jones Cup, they surely exceeded expectations with remarkable victories that put them in contention for a medal finish. As of press time, Ateneo has yet to tangle with Iran, which is composed of cadet players of the Iranian National Team. If the Eagles emerge victorious over Iran, they would end up at third spot in this tourney. If they don’t, they would equal Gilas’ feat last year in the same tournament at fourth place.
With a young and hard working crew, Baldwin was able to whip up a formidable unit that passed the test with flying colors even in such a prestigious international cage tournament as the Jones Cup. Ateneo scored wins over Chinese-Taipei White (87-64), Japan-B (80-74), Indonesia (89-78), Lithuania-LSU (98-65) and Chinese-Taipei Blue (77-76). The Blue Eagles gave themselves a chance for a podium finish with the humongous upset 77-76 victory against the Taiwanese National Team after a booming triple from Matt Nieto in the last three seconds of the game. Baldwin designed a perfect play that set-up that three-point shot, and Nieto delivered the stone-cold dagger right into the hearts of the boisterous Taipei crowd.
New African recruit Ange Kouame of the Ivory Coast was the tournament’s second best rebounder with 10.8 boards per game. The 7’0” center is without a doubt the big difference in this current Blue Eagle band compared to last year’s roster. Kouame is much more skilled, athletic and agile than former foreign-recruit Chibuze Ikeh. He can also bring down the ball with ease and shoot from long-distance. So impressive was Kouame in both the Fil Oil Cup and Jones Cup that the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas is now considering him as a potential future naturalized import for Gilas. If Kouame is cleared to play in this year’s Universities Athletics Association of the Philippines (UAAP), the Blue Eagles will be tough to beat. With Kouame, Ateneo is a complete team because it doesn’t have a very tall local line-up. But what the Eagles have are distinguished discipline, smart offense, no non-sense defense, tenacious fighting heart and a genius bench tactician. They operate on a starless system that thrives on total team effort.
So kudos to the mighty Blue and White—Coach Tab, Manager Epok, Ma’am Debbie, deputies Sandy, Gene, Gabby, Yuri, Ford and Jon, and players Thirdy, Isaac, Matt, Mike, Ange, Anton, Tyler, Aaron, Jolo, Patrick, Gian, Jawuan, Chew, BJ and William.
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