FINDING ANSWERS
The UP Fighting Maroons are now on the verge of pulling off a spectacular feat never before achieved and probably would never happen again: being the only team in the history of the UAAP to capture two championships in the same year.
With its impressive win Sunday night over the Ateneo Blue Eagles in Game 1 of the epic best-of-three UAAP finals, basketball fans like me whose alma mater is the University of the Philippines remain very hopeful that our beloved UP would become back-to-back champions by tomorrow night.
It is that same feeling of infinite hope we first experienced last May in the UAAP basketball series, earlier postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic, when our team was finally crowned champion after a long wait of 36 years or around half a lifetime.
I still remember vividly the thrill of victory that time when, in an instant, the collective dream of all UP alumni finally became true. Our team’s triumph was especially sweet because we eventually rose to the pinnacle of success after all those agonizing years of being a perennial cellar-dweller in the premier collegiate basketball league.
The euphoria that engulfed us then as UP dethroned Ateneo, which came so close to a four-peat win, was unlike any other experienced earlier as we followed our alma mater’s fairy tale rise to the championship.
But the feelings of unbridled passion and deep pride were already evident among UP fans four years ago when we almost made it to the top. Even if Ateneo became champion in 2018, we still were so glad then that we were at the finals at long last. And to make a feel-good story better, some even cautioned Ateneo then to really watch out for UP which never lost a finals series – only because 2018 was the first time UP entered the finals since 1986.
To finally emerge champion instead of runner-up can be truly exhilarating. And if last Sunday’s game was any indication, chances are great that UP would be champion anew. UP seemed so formidable as it led by the end of all four quarters, unlike last May when the suspense was overwhelming because scores were so close all throughout that no team was certain of victory until the game was down to the last split second.
But beyond bagging a championship, what can really be inspiring is the grim determination to overcome tremendous challenges on the way to becoming numero uno. The ability and relentless desire to rise above adversity despite all the heartbreaking setbacks suffered are what form the most inspiring stories basketball can give.
And the UAAP has no shortage of inspirational stories. Just like the UP Fighting Maroons that had risen from the abyss of despair in being a perennial cellar-dweller, the National University Bulldogs made history in 2014 when they emerged champion after 60 long years.
In the Bulldogs’ triumph that finally arrived after a lifetime of losses, one could sense God’s hand in the storybook ending of NU’s arduous journey that squeezed through five do-or-die matches to become the first-ever lowest-seeded team to win the UAAP title.
The way the Bulldogs emerged champion, and no longer the laughing stock and favorite whipping boys in the UAAP, was so dramatic, having been on the brink of elimination five times. NU had to finish off University of the East in a playoff for the last semis slot, eliminate Ateneo twice in the Final Four before demolishing Far Eastern University for the championship.
The Bulldogs’ and Maroons’ chasing of history and their heartwarming triumphs after decades of losses could be local basketball’s contribution to the world’s most inspiring stories of determination and redemption.
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