Black prefers to leave ‘worst loss’ as Ateneo Coach Behind

Ateneo’s 68-88 loss to University of the East in Game 2 of the UAAP men’s basketball finals was coach Norman Black’s worst setback in his four-year collegiate coaching career.

But he said that wouldn’t have any effect on the team when the Blue Eagles go into the deciding Game 3 on Thursday.

“That’s (20-point setback in Game 2) irrelevant,” said Black in a postgame interview. “In this championship series, we have to win two games. We equally have a chance of winning the title.”

Expect Ateneo to be ready in the winner-take-all match, Black promised.

He said that’s how Ateneo has always been after it unexpectedly lost to University of the Philippines early in the eliminations. Since that setback, the Eagles had won 12 straight, including Game 1 of the finals, 78-71.

“At this point of the season, it’s going to be easy to get up on Thursday. We have lost two games all year. Everybody has to realize that we just need one game to win the championship. We are coming to win on Thursday, that’s just it.

“What happens today has no bearing on what’s going to happen on Thursday. We can’t live in the past,” Black said.

Black said that the Blue Eagles didn’t play good defense in Game 2 especially on Elmer Espiritu and Pari Llagas, who combined for 41 points. The Blue Eagles also shot seven-of-34 from three-point range.

“We couldn’t defend them especially the big guys. We started to rely on outside shooting but we really didn’t have a good job defending,” said Black.

The Red Warriors shot 36-of-69 from the field while the Blue Eagles connected on 28 out of 67 attempts.

“They (Warriors) shot the ball extremely well which is something they really haven’t done particularly the big guys so we have to have a better job of defending. We gave up a lot of backdoor (plays). We will work on it on Thursday,” said Black.

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