When feeling blue means feeling great

Nowadays, it’s a blue carpet, not a red carpet, which makes for a grand entrance. If you’re an Atenean, or an avid supporter of the Ateneo de Manila University (ADMU), then, you must be on Cloud Nine these days, and the clouds are floating on blue skies.

Can’t blame you. It is easy to find solace in a hundred and one quotations that cushion the defeats and failures of life–when you’ve lost.

But when you’re the winner, only one quotation makes sense: Winning isn’t everything. It’s the only thing.

Winning is the only thing when you’ve waited 14 years (that’s four presidents ago) to be champ. It’s the only thing when your shears have become dull and rusty waiting to cut the net off the goal. It’s the only thing when you’ve come so close to winning in the last three years, only to be green (pun intended) with envy when the final buzzer sounded.

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When my bad mood (not because of the game, but as virulent as the flu nevertheless), refused to infect my husband Ed last Saturday, when all my attempts at picking a fight with him were met with marshmallow sweetness, I knew a good-mood phenomenon had just infected the Ateneans of the world. Since I lived with two of them (my son Carl is a high school junior), I knew I just had to write this piece. Ateneo had just won the championship and nothing could burst their bubble.

Imagine hundreds of thousands others in a similar good mood–it might as well have been Christmas in October. Tycoon Manny Pangilinan of PLDT, in jubilation, was said to have donated to ADMU twice the usual amount (the usual donation, it is said, is already a whopping P5 million)!

At 4 p.m. on D-Day, Oct. 5, no coup could have been launched against this government even if Gringo Honasan himself tried again–people were not to be distracted. If Abu Sabaya chose this time to come out and prove he was really alive, he would have played to an empty house and drowned in an ocean of apathy. The Ateneo-La Salle championship was the main event and George Bush, Saddam Hussein and Vladimir Putin were only bit players in the world stage as far as basketball-crazy Filipinos were concerned. Thank God Opus Dei founder Jose Maria Escriva was canonized the next day–otherwise he, too, might have been bumped off the front pages of the newspapers of this predominantly Catholic country.

On the day tickets were sold to Ateneo students, the first guy on the line was there since 5:30 p.m. the day before. My son Carl’s classmate who lined up at 5:30 a.m. on the day itself was 600th on the line.

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The good thing about this championship was that it was cloaked with humor, not violence. It was a special event, a gimmick, not a war.

Fr. Ray Holscher, former athletic director of the ADMU, said that in the ’70s, he would never have parked his car near the stadium while an Ateneo-La Salle match was going on. This time, parking was a problem, but there were no reports of vandalism or violence between the two camps.

There was a cartoon on the Internet of a La Sallite and an Atenean face to face. The La Sallite was just in his green uniform. The Atenean was in full battle gear, complete with jacket and placard. And the La Sallite tells the Atenean: "First time mo?"

Strumm’s Jupiter played up its giant TV screen and invited both Ateneans and La Sallites to duel, which they did, over a few drinks. Ateneans dominated the first floor of Strumm’s. La Sallites conquered the second floor. My husband shared a table with fellow Atenean Jess Garcia, the advertising manager of Philippine Airlines, and his son, Javier. Bets were raised. There was a P300,000 bet between one class of La Salle and its counterpart (from the same batch) from Ateneo. There were even cheerleaders!

* * *

Sports analyst or not, you could see that Ateneo was in control virtually during the entire game 3. They were poised, and unruffled even during a La Salle rally. They were hungry.

When it was all over and the hard court became a sea of blue and white balloons, Wesley Gonzalez, one of the Ateneo star players, could only gush, "It’s just so great!"

What was striking really, was also how every player, to a man, thanked God and attributed their victory to him. MVP Rico Villanueva said maybe it was God’s will that they lost the championship last year, so that they would learn from their mistakes. Coach Joel Banal also offered praise to God, but on earth attributed Ateneo’s victory to "rebounds and defense."

Team chaplain Fr. Tito Kaluag S.J. said, "Every year, since 1999, we came this close to a championship and each time we’re left with a painful loss. But we kept the faith."

Fr. Holscher agrees. "We’ve always been the bridesmaid, never the bride."

What made the victory ever so sweet, was that Ateneo really came from far behind and was almost eliminated. "We had to work up the ladder, it was a very hard climb. We suffered injuries, a suspension. We fought to get up the ladder and never lost our focus."

Victory was sweet also because Ateneans felt they not only wrested the title from La Salle, they also stopped the Archers from setting a record.

According to a text message I received, "On Sept. 14, La Salle failed to make it 14-0. On Oct. 5, it failed to make it five championships straight."

Still, for avid La Salle supporters like publicist Bob Zozobrado, "La Salle lost the title, but not its honor."And life goes on for both Ateneans and La Sallites. Why, a lot of them are even married to each other.

But for now, Ateneans can be forgiven for thinking that the skies are really bluer on a perfect day.