Red Lions Ready To Stop Pirates Winning Streak

Guest team Lyceum of the Philippines coach Bonnie Tan yesterday admitted the Pirates, who have a 2-0 mark and a share of the lead with two other squads, will be the underdog when they clash with defending champion San Beda College at 4 p.m. today in the resumption of the 87th NCAA men’s basketball tournament at The Arena in San Juan.


"Hindi na natin ka-level ito (Red Lions). We just got lucky dahil medyo magaan ‘yung schedule ng first two games namin. Pero laban lang. We’ll try to give them a good fight," said Tan.

The Pirates whipped College of St. Benilde 75-63 and University of Perpetual Help 93-87 in their past two games to share the lead with San Sebastian and Letran.

The Pirates have three good men in Chris Cayabyab (18.5 points per game), Allan Santos (15 points, 11 rebounds) and Floricel Guevarra (13.5 pts, 5.5 boards) who can light up the scoreboard but are up against an array of talented big players from San Beda.

The Red Lions, who opened their campaign with an 82-52 rout of the Altas, will once again lean on big man Jake Pascual (12 points, 13 rebounds) and the high-scoring Dave Marcelo (10 points, 15 rebounds), with cat-quick Amer Baser directing traffic against Lyceum’s weaker guard rotation.

A win by the Lions will give them a 2-0 mark.