Drawing board: How UST suffered its first loss at DLSU’s hands
By Francis Marvin De Ungria
This article will go into detail on how the UST Growling Tigers kept up with the DLSU Green Archers in the first half, and why UST only scored six points in the third quarter which spelled their defeat last Wednesday afternoon at the Philsports Arena in Pasig.
UST’s Notable Performers:
Miguel Pangilinan — 11 points | nine rebounds | five offensive rebounds | three assists
Nicael Cabañero — 10 points | seven rebounds | three assists
Adama Faye — 10 points | seven rebounds | three blocks
Paul Manalang — 10 points | three assists | 66.7 percent from 3
Jamba Garing — six points | eight rebounds | four offensive rebounds
This game might appear as a bad performance in comparison to Cabanero’s first game vs Adamson, but overall it was a solid outing for him. Without Cabañero, the game would have turned worse as he scored eight of UST’s first points in the opening salvo.
He continued to show his bag, especially when given space, with a turn-around fadeaway against Deschon Winston, a quick floater against Benjamin Phillips, a euro against Mike Phillips, and in his last play weaving through the paint for a smooth shot once again over Winston.
His last basket was in the fourth quarter where he still finished the drive despite the dangerous fall.
But this game also showed his weakness as DLSU capitalized on them for easy baskets on the other end.
As he drove to the baseline in the first play, he instantly jumped at the sight of three defenders moving towards him. This is usually where “probing or “probe dribble” is very effective. Probing is when a player dribbles through the lane to see how the defense will react, from there they can then make a read in a triple-threat position (shoot, drive, pass). If he probed for a little while here, he’d realize that Manalang and Pangilinan were wide open for the three.
In the second play, he tried to drive past Winston but was meet with a wall as Phillips and Kevin Quaimbao triple teamed him. Once again, if he probed for a little while, he could have kicked it out to Pangilinan or Lazarte.
He drove again this time against Joaqui Manuel. The fadeaway jumper he did would have been a bad shot but this was Cabañero and he was making these types of shots consistently in the last game, so taking this shot was understandable. But if he probed again for a little while, he’ll see Lazarte open in the weak side and Pangilinan in the arc.
It was not Cabañero’s entire fault in the last play. Royce Mantua should be in the corner to avoid his defender from helping off a Cabañero drive. Lazarte should be in the corner so Pangilinan can position much farther from the center which should give Cabañero some passing options. Instead, the poor spacing led to four players containing the Cabañero drive thus resulting in a Winston tip and a Mark Nonoy interception.
Even with the turnovers and mistakes, we were still treated to some playmaking flashes as Cabañero and Adama Faye connected multiple times.
Cabañero looked comfortable as he made good reads against drop coverages off the pick and roll, waiting for the right time to throw the pass for a Faye slam and then splitting the defense which led to another Faye slam.
In the next play, as Cabañero led the transition offense, he found Faye with a lob pass for another slam.
The only time Cabañero did great against blitz coverage was in the last play as he went around Bright Nwankwo giving him a driving lane. With two defenders crowding on him he finds a drop pass to Faye for another slam.
Miguel Pangilinan was one of the guys who stepped up in this game as he showed hustle grabbing offensive rebounds resulting in easy baskets. He also made two catch-and-shoot threes which should be a target for Cabañero in the wings moving forward.
Paul Manalang was another player that can provide some scoring punch off the bench. He displayed an ability, even in the preseason, to knock down pull-up three-pointers — and that showed in this game as he knocked down two of them.
Jamba Garing should be right there in the UAAP’s best rebounding guards after this performance. He’ll be a key piece for the Growling Tigers this season with his hustle resulting in easy transition baskets or second-chance points.
Richi Calimag has the stroke to be a very capable three-point shooter off the catch and there isn’t any reason why he shouldn’t play with Cabañero to provide spacing or have UST run sets that gets him these types of shots more.
The UST Growling Tigers were another victim of the daunted press of the DLSU Green Archers. If the Tigers threw long-range lazy passes while DLSU was pressing, then you could expect them to take advantage as seen in the clips.
UST was still giving up open corner threes which led to easy three-point shots. As I’ve pointed out here in my previous post-game thread vs Adamson, good shooting teams like DLSU would punish them and capitalize on this. They should make some adjustments in defense to minimize or avoid giving up this type of shot.
By no means was this a disappointing loss by the Growling Tigers though. Even without Evan Nelle, the Green Archers were the better team on paper and are a serious title contender this season. A lot of the mistakes and weaknesses pointed out here are also essential learning curves that the team is bound to experience given the circumstances. UST’s next game versus the NU Bulldogs tomorrow will be as crucial as ever as this will dictate if the Growling Tigers have what it takes to be a Final Four contender or if they will be at the bottom come the end of the season.
