MANILA, Philippines - San Beda and Jose Rizal U scored expected victories over Emilio Aguinaldo and St. Benilde, respectively, to remain within sight of unbeaten pacesetter San Sebastian College in the NCAA seniors basketball tournament at The Arena in San Juan City yesterday.
The Lions used a balanced offensive game to blast the Generals, 94-63, for their 10th win against a loss while the Bombers leaned on a spectacular individual effort by John Wilson to trounce the Blazers, 95-85.
Wilson, 22, exploded with a career and league-high 48 points to power the Bombers to their ninth victory against two losses for third.
All 15 Lions who saw action scored at least a point with Dave Marcelo, Garvo Lanete and Sudan Daniel leading the way with 14, 12 and 11 points, respectively, while Bam Bam Gamalinda and Adler dela Rosa added 10 points apiece.
San Beda overwhelmed EAC even without starting guard Borgie Hermida, who was indisposed.
The Generals absorbed their ninth loss against two wins.
Wilson’s scoring binge also shattered some of the league’s scoring records.
He posted the best individual effort in an NCAA seniors’ match since the legendary Lim Eng Beng of former league member La Salle unloaded 55 points 35 years ago.
Wilson also set the highest field goal conversions (18) and three-pointers (9) in a game while highlighting it with another career-best 17 rebounds as he bounced back in the hunt for the MVP plum.
The previous high since Beng’s 55-point explosion was 37 points recorded by RJ Jazul of Letran last season.
“He was simply amazing,” said Jose Rizal coach Ariel Vanguardia of his talented fourth-year guard.
“We need him (Wilson) to step up because (James) Sena and (Marvin) Hayes didn’t practice much due to some minor injuries. He also didn’t shoot that well in our last couple of games,” he said.
Vanguardia was referring to Wilson’s season low five-point performance although reserve John Agas stepped up to fire 27 points and help steer Jose Rizal to an 82-68 win over Perpetual Help last week.
Mark de Guzman paced CSB with 23 points but the Blazers struggled without skipper Jeff Morial, who sustained a knee injury in their 72-82 defeat to the Arellano U Chiefs.
St. Benilde fell to their seventh setback against four wins, or three games behind joint fourth placers Arellano U and Letran (7-4).