Knights smother Red Lions

Letran shrugged off a lethargic start and dominated San Beda with a sleek running game in the second half as the defending champion Knights came away with a 70-55 victory over the Red Lions yesterday in the 80th NCAA basketball tournament at the Rizal Memorial Coliseum.

In the other game, host Perpetual Help unleashed a second half explosion as it smothered St. Benilde, 95-75, to create a three-way tie at second place with Letran and PCU on 2-1 (win-loss) slates behind unbeaten Mapua (3-0).

Ace gunner Ronjay Enrile fired 16 points and drew a solid 14-point performance from the 6-foot-7 Mark Andaya, a transferee from MLQU, to power the Knights to their second victory in three games that more than made up for their sorry 76-86 loss to the Mapua Cardinals last week.

Aaron Aban and John Paul Alcaraz, another new recruit from Las Piñas College, tossed in 10 and 8 points, respectively.

Unlike in their error-marred setback to the Cards, the Knights played more as a team this time.

"Just what I’ve predicted, we’ll win this game if we minimize our turnovers, which we did today (yesterday)," said Letran coach Louie Alas, whose chargers turned the ball over only 14 times as against the 27 errors they committed against Mapua.

San Beda also drew 16 points from Jeff Bombeo but no other Red Lion churned out more than seven points as they fell to their second straight setback after back-to-back victories.

San Beda roared in the early going for a 9-0 lead with Bombeo, playing his fifth and last season, rookie Yousef Aljamal and Alex Angeles combining for that big start.