KUWAIT CITY, Jan 27: Despite their 57-75 loss to Eagles Alliance, the The-One squad finished the better team in terms of coordination and performance distribution among the players with scoring spread out evenly among them on Friday as the UAE Exchange Xpress Money PABAK 30th conference games played at the Hawally Disabled Sports Club continued.
Rafael Abalos was the hero of the opening moments of the game as he threw two successive long volleys from the center straight into the Eagles hoop to open the The-One score sheet with 6 points. He flung open the floodgates for team mate Danmark Glean whose affair with the hoop begun right away with two consecutive 2-pointers.
But The-One’s barrages prompted some quick replies from Eagles’ Richard Beltran and Jhopet Mathias who partnered to bring their side neck-to-neck with the opposition, just a nose ahead to finish the opening round 13-12 in their favor.

Riding on the momentum scripted by Beltran and Mathias, the Eagles soared above The-One to finish the second quarter almost scoring twice as many points as the opposition, 22-12. The-One relied on team work but with a weakened ability to find the opposition hoop as the Eagles had moved to tighten their defenses in the face of coordinated attacks in the opening round. The-One’s scores came in trickles through the rounds with almost all players getting on the scorecard.
Eagles’ talisman pair Mathias and Beltran in the second half of the game rallied their side with barrages to a 5-point advantage, 15-10 at the end of round three. But The-One’s strategy of all-hands-on-deck offense paid off as more players of the side contributed in scoring. But the strategy left them vulnerable in defense as the Eagles managed in the final stretch to outscore them to finish the final round 25-23, closing the game at 75-57 at the buzzer.
James Carillo was also instrumental in the final round for Eagles Alliance, adding 8 points to the final tally. Mathias shot 31 while Beltran added 24 with the rest of the team taking care of the rest in the win. But The-One’s loss came as almost all players got on the scorecard with contributions in their side’s heroic loss.

KOC-EMS on the other hand came from behind to take the game against On-Time to a convincing 87-80 win. KOC’s Angel Rillo opened scoring with a 3-pointer and quickly followed up with another two paving the way for Paul Doma to weigh in with his delectable runs, dazzling the On-Time defense to hit home some early valuable points. Pascual and Billiones, the juggernauts of the On-Time side weighed in to score some points in reply to the KOC advances, taking the On-Time into the lead through the first half with KOC always not far behind. The first half score stood at 40-34 for On-Time.
KOC managed to turn the tables in the final half, Jim Alvarez, Richard Ison and Bakili starring in the rally alternating in scoring to bring the game to an 87-80 finish for their side.
Elsewhere in the tournament Erwin Bartholome scored 29 points to steer GCC-Vipers back into winning ways with an 85-72 defeat over ATC Chillis. ATC took an early lead as Dean Basco opened scoring followed by Arbie Dival to end the first round 22-18.

Villoria, Rustia and Perdido who finished with 15, 12 and 9 points on the Vipers’ side, partnered to bring the fight squarely to Chillis resulting in a first half standoff at 44-40. With Paul Andrade joining the fray in the Vipers’ attack, the catering specialists successfully stymied most ATC attempts at the hoop to finish the game with a wide 13-gap at 85-72.
With Henry Remueta, Dingson and Napala finishing with 24, 19 and 12 apiece, Conor Express Cargo made an easy job of their meeting with FBC-SMDC, handing them an 85-80 score line. Conor Express overcame a 14-point deficit at the close of the first half to jump to the lead in the third round courtesy Soriano’s steely defensive skills. With the wind still in their sails, the Express cargo men took the game into the final stretch to win finally with 85-80. Rimueta and Dingson shouldered most of the Express Cargo scoring, accounting for 43 of the 85 scored by their side.

Brgy-Salmiya went down 74-93 against Chicken-Inasal Shooters in another exciting encounter of the tournament. Shane Coppin and Jeff Salameda led the Shooters to the win with 31 and 19 points apiece in a game that saw Salmiya pick up from a 10-point deficit in the opening round to dominate in the second and closing the half just 2 points ahead at 38-36.
But Salmiya in the third round lost focus, allowing Chicken-Inasal to claw back to steal the win with some last-ditch rally and barrages that saw the Salmiya side buckle under pressure, hardly finding the opposition hoop in the last quarter, leading to an Inasal basket harvest with Coppin, Salmeda and Vidal having a field day, alternating in scoring to lead their side to the 93-74 win.
M-Tag clinched an easy default win with 20 points over Marine Spa as the latter failed to show up for a scheduled encounter between the two sides in the tournament.

In the penultimate match, Destroyer convincingly defeated Ilonggo Heat 73-69. While all rounds of the game were skewed in favor of Destroyer, the game saw balanced scoring on the latter’s side with James Carillo scoring 16, Cabali 11, Fermil 6, Zuluata 5 with the rest spread over other team members. But scoring on the Heat side was mainly concentrated on Garceta who finished at 20, Obordo 9 and Taleti 5.
Marvin Sumague and Roxas together scored 51 points to lead Marina Volts to a 91-76 win against Mind-Web in the final game of the day. Mind-Web led in the first round but lost the initiative to the Volts who sustained the pressure to the end. Game ended 91-76 in favor of the Marina Volts.