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‘Losing doesn’t help us mature easily,’ admits Ateneo coach Tab Baldwin as the once-mighty Blue Eagles horribly crash to the bottom of the UAAP men’s basketball team standings
MANILA, Philippines – Perhaps no team feels the pressure of breaking out of a slump more than the once-mighty Ateneo Blue Eagles.
After Ateneo horribly crashed to the bottom of the UAAP Season 87 men’s basketball team standings at the end of the first round, coach Tab Baldwin offered no excuses, even saying the Blue Eagles need to “rise to the expectations.”
“We have to handle the pressure of being Blue Eagles in a not great year, and we have to rise to the expectations of ourselves and our community,” said Baldwin as Ateneo deals with its worst start in the Final Four era.
“We need to reach the level of the league and establish that we should be respected for the quality of play we put on the court,” he added.
“So far, we haven’t done that… There’s no excuses for it.”
Ateneo — the UAAP champion just two years ago — finished with the same 1-6 record as the FEU Tamaraws, but the tiebreak sent the Blue Eagles to the eighth and last spot.
The Blue Eagles’ lone win came against the Adamson Falcons, 60-51.
As Baldwin acknowledged the team’s “unprecedented” position right now, he knows the need to step on the gas in the second round.
“We do not want to hear the line ‘Win or lose, it’s the school we choose.’ We don’t want to hear that line [in Ateneo’s team battlecry],” Baldwin said.
“We don’t want people to come to us and say that we don’t want the pressure, but we want to handle the pressure better.”
The Blue Eagles have struggled to establish their interior presence in the first round as foreign student-athlete Victor Balogun played limited minutes, forcing Baldwin to rely on a lean frontcourt rotation bannered by rookie Kris Porter, Kyle Ong, and undersized bigs Shawn Tuano and Andrew Bongo.
It also did not help that highly touted rookie Jared Bahay has struggled to find his mark in the UAAP, shooting just 25% from the field, including a lackluster 20.34% from the three-point area.
One of the few bright spots for Ateneo has been the 20-year-old Tuano, who leads the team in scoring with 11.14 points per game, despite mostly playing off the bench in the first round.
Tuano is one of the four second-year players of the Blue Eagles, who also have seven rookies and four veterans.
Keeping his high regard for his players, Baldwin doesn’t want to use the team’s youthfulness and inexperience as excuses for their performances.
“They’ve had half a season to become seasoned and become more experienced,” said Baldwin.
“Losing doesn’t help us mature easily. It’s hard, and you guys are witnessing a very interesting sporting dynamic which I lived through before, but these kids haven’t.”
Baldwin, who has mentored in numerous countries in his 46-year career and served as national team coach for the Philippines and New Zealand, said the Blue Eagles just need to stick to the basic.
“It’s a simple formula. You’ve got to put all the good stuff together with the other good stuff, and make the bad stuff a lot less,” the American-Kiwi coach said.
Baldwin sees no reason, too, to dwell on their misfortunes.
“It is what it is.” – Rappler.com
