Eagles have landed; Warriors stalled

The Ateneo Blue Eagles soared mightily over the Ken Bono-led Adamson Falcons and scored a close 76-73 victory to barge into the UAAP men’s basketball finals for the first time in three years even as University of Santo Tomas foiled University of the East’s own bid with a 79-75 victory at the packed Araneta Coliseum yesterday.

JC Intal churned out a 17-point production and hauled down 11 rebounds then drew solid support from Macky Escalona, Chris Tiu and Doug Kramer, who combined for 34 points, as the Eagles bucked Bono’s career-tying 33-point splurge to return to the finals since losing to the Far Eastern U Tams three years ago.

Bono unloaded 14 of his 33 points in the fourth quarter, including three triples but the leading MVP statistical race leader failed to carry the Falcons to what could be their first championship appearance since reaching the finals in 1992.

"For him (Bono) to step up and hit three triples in the fourth quarter is really amazing, I couldn’t blame my players for that," said Ateno coach Norman Black.

"It feels good being in the finals, especially so for my seniors (Intal, Escalona and Kramer)," said Black.

That could not be said of the Warriors, who had hoped to join the Eagles in the best-of-three title series with a victory over the Tigers in the other Final Four contest.

But the España-based cagers had other things in mind.

Jun Cortez stepped up in the last 21.1 seconds, scoring six of his seven points to lift the Tigers to the victory and force a rubber match with the Warriors for the other final berth on Thursday.

Sophomore Mark Canlas came through with career-best 16 points for the Tigers, now eyeing a first championship stint in seven years.

"What can I say, the players really wanted to win this game," said UST coach Pido Jarencio.

Earlier, Jonathan Banal, son of San Beda coach Koy Banal, fired seven of his 20 points in the fourth quarter as the Baby Tams downed the Adamson Baby Falcons, 76-66, to clinch the other finals berth in the juniors division.

The Ateneo Eaglets made it straight to the best-of-three finals after sweeping the elimination round in 12 games.

In women’s action, FEU and Santo Tomas arranged their own best-of-three title showdown after hurdling Ateneo and State U, respectively.

The Lady Tams leaned on Aurora Adriano in defeating the Lady Eagles, 46-44, while the Tigresses came back from 14-points down in the final period to turn back the Lady Maroons, 72-68.