winning ugly

brad gilbert once said that doing whatever it takes to win is doing enough to get the desired result: a win. you studied your opponent closely and developed a game plan that would address his weaknesses and you stuck to it and won. you may not have the best strokes, the best serve, the best return, but by doing what you needed to win, it didn’t matter if you looked ugly.

gilbert established himself not only as a tier 2 professional player but as the coach of andre agassi, the fiery player from las vegas who achieved his career slam late in his career.

i bring him up in light of the exciting FEU-UST game last saturday at the big dome where FEU, for the third time in 5 outings, eked out a come-from-behind victory over an inspired jeric teng-led UST growling tigers.  with 24 seconds left in the game, the reigning MVP, rr garcia, looked to make it into a one-ball possession for the tams with a last minute shot to avoid 5 minutes of overtime that could go UST’s way.  using up 14 seconds of dwindling time, he drove down the lane, the defense collapsing on him.  he dished a no-look pass to a wide-open cris tolomia who stood calmly outside the arc as he made a trey with only 2.9 seconds left. with no timeouts left for either team, a desperate UST shot the ball from downcourt which was dreadfully short. the tamaraws had slipped past the tigers, 62-59, the second time they won by 3 points in a week’s time.

i told L, my trusty patron ticket provider for all FEU games (except for the exciting one slated for this saturday against the blue eagles), that i liked how FEU’s first round of games were shaping up.  losing badly to the adamson falcons in their first game, they climbed to barely-there victories in their outings against UE, NU, and, two days ago, UST.  on their AdU loss, i jokingly told my brother that it was so much better to lose by much (they suffered the ignominy of a 20-point+ loss to the falcons) than by one or two points, which would have broken their hearts.  the tamaraws, winning on luck, chance, or pure serendipity in the last three outings, are learning early that nothing comes easy and that they need to work on defensive sets and gelling as a team.

as it is, i’m not comfortable with the way bert flores keeps experimenting with different combinations of players, mixing three big men (cawaling, ramos, and sentchu) with two guards (garcia and romeo), or three small men (garcia, romeo, tolomia/excimiano) with two big men (ramos/cawaling and sentchu).  when things appear to be working well in terms of the chemistry of the players on the floor, flores introduces substitutions at that point, and i’m thinking it’s to experiment with yet another set of players and plays.

winning ugly in the last three games, i’m hoping that FEU begin to win beautiful entering the second round of games.  this is not to discount their coming two games against UP and ateneo, this thursday and saturday, respectively.  (yes, i will be there to watch both match-ups!)

i do believe that they are the only team capable of making a dent in the ateneo juggernaut and possibly share the top spot with this season’s hosts.  if they don’t, i’m happy enough with their second place status.  but not secure enough. without their big men from last year, cervantes and noundou, FEU struggle in dominating the boards on both ends and clogging up the centre to deflate drives from offense-orientated teams like ateneo and adamson.  with no signature play to their name, the tamaraws seem to struggle to find themselves in a league populated with teams with trademark plays (i.e. the DLSU full-court press, for one).

no doubt about it, the tamaraws have the unbridled talent but if they want to take it all the way this year after coming so close last season, they will have to start doing what it takes to win, even if it is scrappy and ugly.  as their cheering fans do with military-like arm movements, one can only yell, “let’s go, tamaraws, let’s go!”