Toyota Ol\u2019Aces I bagged its second consecutive BANMI Budweiser Cup championship after sweeping archrival APC Brothers, 97-96, in another bruising game Wednesday night that saw a near free-for-all erupt as time expired.<\/p>\n
Ol\u2019Aces I trailed the entire first half as Brothers started the game with great energy and focus expected from a team a game away from kissing its championship hopes goodbye.<\/p>\n
With high-scoring swingman Freddie Peliseman knocking down jumpers and one-man-fastbreak Tony Diaz doing his best Road Runner impersonation, Brothers were on top 26-22 after a quarter of play.<\/p>\n
Ol\u2019Aces I continued to grope for form in the second stanza as leading scorer Peter Camacho got bottled up. Brothers, meanwhile, continued to get a steady dose of Peliseman\u2019s scoring plus some aggressive inside forays by playmaker Rick Alegre.<\/p>\n
Things got testy between the two teams at the tailend of the half. With Brothers ahead by 11 points, Alegre and Ol\u2019Aces I playing coach Elias Rangamar fell down near the endline and were slow to get up. <\/p>\n
A few moments later Ol\u2019Aces I enforcer Romeo Iginoef joined the scene and jawed with Alegre. Fortunately cool heads prevailed and Ol\u2019Aces I rallied and made it an 8-point game, 51-43, at lemontime.<\/p>\n
Fired up by the events that transpired before the end of the first half, Ol\u2019Aces I began the third with a sense of purpose and outscored Brothers 12-0 at one point to take the driver\u2019s seat.<\/p>\n
After a being silenced in the second, Peter Camacho suddenly woke up in the period and sizzled for 10 points on an assortment of shots.<\/p>\n
His brother Abong, the most dominant big man in the CNMI if he puts his mind to it, also aided Ol\u2019Aces I\u2019s comeback scoring 8 points on left-handed, point-blank thrusts to the basket.<\/p>\n
After all was said in done, Ol\u2019Aces I wiped the floor with Brothers, outscoring them 34-17, in the third to go up 77-68 going into the payoff period.<\/p>\n
But Brothers were far from finished. With Peliseman all but handcuffed by Abong and Edsel Mendoza\u2019s suffocating defense and do-it-all forward Ed Diaz having an off night scoring, Tony Diaz rose to the occasion and defied Ol\u2019Aces I\u2019s giants on the inside.<\/p>\n
Brothers\u2019 own behemoth, 6\u20194\u201d Oscar Ada also joined the fray and his surprising two-handed slam with 8:15 remaining narrowed the count to 76-79.<\/p>\n
Youth cager Mel Manibusan further stoke the fires of Brothers\u2019 rally putting back a miss to cut the deficit to a single point, 78-79.<\/p>\n
Ol\u2019Aces I answered with an 8-0 run of its own time down to 5:37. But Brothers would just not go away and labored the next four minutes to get one last crack at Ol\u2019Aces I.<\/p>\n
The opportunity came when Ada\u2019s inside stab made it a 95-91 game in favor of Ol\u2019Aces I with 1:16 left in the game clock.<\/p>\n
Following an exchange of turnovers and the last two of Ada\u2019s six missed free throws, Iginoef got free under the basket to make it a 6-point game 21 ticks left.<\/p>\n
After a Tony Diaz bucket made it 97-93, Ol\u2019Aces I failed to seal the win when Abong lost the ball to the endline.<\/p>\n
Jeff Diaz finished the scoring with a connection from 25 feet out but while the Brothers\u2019 3-point sniper was releasing his shot Abong and Peliseman were busy exchanging blows at center court.<\/p>\n
The commotion spilled over after the game and Peliseman reportedly filed a complaint against Abong, who in turn counter charged.<\/p>\n
The incident marred an otherwise exciting ballgame and sort of dampened the post-game awards presentation and victory party of Ol\u2019Aces I.<\/p>\n
Finals MVP Peter Camacho led the way for Ol\u2019Aces I with 21 points before fouling out, while four other teammates registered double-digit scores.<\/p>\n
Peliseman paced Brothers with 30 hard-earned points and had a busted lip to show for it. Regular season MVP Tony Diaz finished with 27 points, while brother Ed was held down to 10.<\/p>\n
Ol\u2019Aces I 97 \u2013 P. Camacho 21, A. Camacho 18, Santos 16, Rangamar 14, Iginoef 13, Mendoza 9, Renguul 4.<\/p>\n
Brothers 96 \u2013 Peliseman 30, T. Diaz 27, E. Diaz 10, Ada 9, Alegre 9, Manibusan 8, J. Diaz 3.<\/p>\n
Scoring by quarters: 22-26, 43-51, 77-68, 97-96.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Toyota Ol\u2019Aces I bagged its second consecutive BANMI Budweiser Cup championship after sweeping archrival APC Brothers, 97-96, in another bruising game Wednesday night that saw a near free-for-all erupt as time expired.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-81029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=81029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81029\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=81029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=81029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}