Reflections on this year's PSHS Alumni Basketball League
For the past three weeks, I have accepted my batchmate Jerms Reyes’s invitation to become the writer for this year’s Philippine Science High School Alumni Basketball League. These tournaments showcases the alumni batches of our alma mater as they engage in 5-on-5 wholecourt matches complete with official referees and statisticians. For this year, my batch was assigned as the organizing committee for the tournament. Jerms Reyes was the Commissioner and helping him along the duties were Aro De Joya as Deputy Commissioner, and Jamel Pangandaman as Statistics Encoder. Two game dates had already passed when I joined the team. Aside from the pay, I was really looking forward to try a form of writing that I haven’t done ever: sports-writing. I had to attend every single game in the tournament, and write about the highlights and events that had happened in each of those matches. The elimination game dates were from 8 A.M. to 8 P.M., and it could become tiring as those hours pass as I had to carefully watch the teams play. Our batch also entered the tournament, and I had to play for our team as well. But it was definitely worth it and I learned so much from the experience. I got to know more people from my alma mater, check out how their teams play and learn from them. I got to practice writing for a different subject and exercise those skills. I got to play again with my talented batch-mates: people who are very passionate about the sport and highly competitive with a winning and determining attitude.
Our batch was talented: we had Jamel Pangandaman as our main scorer, able to slash fearlessly to the basket against all defenders, Reece Hugo who was our designated spot-up three point shooter, whose long range game surfaced this season, Alvin Tang who was our solid pivotman in the post, Mikko Martinez, a hustling and athletic forward, Aro De Joya, our mainman who takes care of the point guard duties and talented in passing to cutting slashers, Sheen Gonzales who took up the role of energy guy in the team this season, Jerms Reyes who plays just as hard despite nursing knee injuries, Ronell Lee who could provide good minutes in the post, Gero David who despite his confessed lack of conditioning, plays with heart, Paul Libo-on who came to our last game and provided for a good backcourt, and JB Aliling who appeared in the first games as another solid scoring option. As to my role, since we lacked big men in our bench, I had to come in as the back-up center for Alvin Tang.
Sadly, our season ended at the quarterfinal stage of the tournament. Despite winning all five of our matches in the elimination round, our batch was ranked third in the overall standings because of quotient rules. We then had to face the tall and strong line-up of the Administration team: a squad filled with teachers and staff of the high school. Our team was outhustled in the running game and outrebounded in the post. It was also the worst of luck that the shots of Reece Hugo were not knocking down unlike in the eliminations, and Jamel always found his shots unluckily slipping out the rim.
It really was depressing to see our season end that way again. Last year we also flashed our way in the eliminations and got knocked out in the first round. I couldn’t help but feel so visibly sad that day as our team gave its best in every game that we went to. Seeing Batch 2003, the back-to-back champions win the coveted title this year made me envious. They were so happy, vibrant, and energetic as they won the championship. One can’t help but notice their spirit of team basketball with the way they play as one, fielding sometimes a twenty-plus line-up without anyone in their team complaining about their limited minutes. They were like a family whenever they played, complete with non-playing batchmates who attended the games just to cheer for their batch. Of course they were top-notch in talent, but it also helped that they were enjoying what they do, and was great in number.
It was brought up in the huddle after our game all the factors that led to our loss. One of us cited the lack of players that we have compared to some of the teams. But Gero David quickly dismissed that idea: he knew that it couldn’t be helped with that problem. This was already the core of our playing batch, the only people willing to sacrifice time to play for that league. We know that there are more people in our batch who could contribute to our desire to finally win that coveted championship, but if they are not willing to play, then we shouldn’t push them to do so.
That fact saddened me even further. We know as a batch that we could be victorious in this league. We had talent and size if ever we filled up our roster with the best of our batch, but we could not do that. If only most of us had the same passion that Gero, Aro, Jerms, Chow, and the rest of our core possessed, we could be good contenders for the title. But like Gero said, we need to focus more on those willing. The batch will again prepare itself for one more year, hopefully this time with more practice and more set drills. The desire to win that title would never fade in the coming years, and we hope that that desire would never die out.
Our batch was talented: we had Jamel Pangandaman as our main scorer, able to slash fearlessly to the basket against all defenders, Reece Hugo who was our designated spot-up three point shooter, whose long range game surfaced this season, Alvin Tang who was our solid pivotman in the post, Mikko Martinez, a hustling and athletic forward, Aro De Joya, our mainman who takes care of the point guard duties and talented in passing to cutting slashers, Sheen Gonzales who took up the role of energy guy in the team this season, Jerms Reyes who plays just as hard despite nursing knee injuries, Ronell Lee who could provide good minutes in the post, Gero David who despite his confessed lack of conditioning, plays with heart, Paul Libo-on who came to our last game and provided for a good backcourt, and JB Aliling who appeared in the first games as another solid scoring option. As to my role, since we lacked big men in our bench, I had to come in as the back-up center for Alvin Tang.
Sadly, our season ended at the quarterfinal stage of the tournament. Despite winning all five of our matches in the elimination round, our batch was ranked third in the overall standings because of quotient rules. We then had to face the tall and strong line-up of the Administration team: a squad filled with teachers and staff of the high school. Our team was outhustled in the running game and outrebounded in the post. It was also the worst of luck that the shots of Reece Hugo were not knocking down unlike in the eliminations, and Jamel always found his shots unluckily slipping out the rim.
It really was depressing to see our season end that way again. Last year we also flashed our way in the eliminations and got knocked out in the first round. I couldn’t help but feel so visibly sad that day as our team gave its best in every game that we went to. Seeing Batch 2003, the back-to-back champions win the coveted title this year made me envious. They were so happy, vibrant, and energetic as they won the championship. One can’t help but notice their spirit of team basketball with the way they play as one, fielding sometimes a twenty-plus line-up without anyone in their team complaining about their limited minutes. They were like a family whenever they played, complete with non-playing batchmates who attended the games just to cheer for their batch. Of course they were top-notch in talent, but it also helped that they were enjoying what they do, and was great in number.
It was brought up in the huddle after our game all the factors that led to our loss. One of us cited the lack of players that we have compared to some of the teams. But Gero David quickly dismissed that idea: he knew that it couldn’t be helped with that problem. This was already the core of our playing batch, the only people willing to sacrifice time to play for that league. We know that there are more people in our batch who could contribute to our desire to finally win that coveted championship, but if they are not willing to play, then we shouldn’t push them to do so.
That fact saddened me even further. We know as a batch that we could be victorious in this league. We had talent and size if ever we filled up our roster with the best of our batch, but we could not do that. If only most of us had the same passion that Gero, Aro, Jerms, Chow, and the rest of our core possessed, we could be good contenders for the title. But like Gero said, we need to focus more on those willing. The batch will again prepare itself for one more year, hopefully this time with more practice and more set drills. The desire to win that title would never fade in the coming years, and we hope that that desire would never die out.