FilOil: DLSU's option play leads to Jeron Teng's game-tying triple

The situation: June 2, the final day of the elimination round of the 2012 FilOil Flying V Pre-season Tournament. DLSU is trailing ADMU by 3, 53-50, with 18.8 seconds to go.

DLSU has Almond Vosotros (17) inbounding the ball, with Norbert Torres (6), Yutien Andrada (20), Jeron Teng (24) and LA Revilla (12).

ADMU counters with Oping Sumalinog (17), JP Erram (10), Nico Salva (8), Kiefer Ravena (15) and Juami Tiongson (5).

Vosotros triggers the ball into the hands of Revilla, starting the play.

Vostros then cuts baseline, and gets a triple screen from Teng, Torres and Andrada to free him up on the right-hand corner. Credit goes to his defender, Sumalinog, who manages to stick with him the entire time.

That takes away La Salle's initial option, with 4.8 seconds burned. Time to go to option 2.

This time, it's Revilla's turn to go baseline, using Torres and Andrada as screens again.

Here's where things start to go wrong for Ateneo. On the right-hand side, Tiongson is several steps behind Revilla, making him an option for a triple. At the same time though, Ravena has strayed from the perimeter, trapped between Erram and Erram's man Torres. He's essentially been picked off by the big man, which frees Teng up.

Vostoros notices this and locates Teng, while Torres moves to block Ravena, costing him a valuable second. Take note, in the screengrab below, Revilla is also wide open for a triple.

Knowing he's been beaten by his man, Ravena immediately leaps to block the shot, but it's a fake!

Oping moves over to help but it's too late, and Ravena, to his credit, actually has the hops to recover and challenge the shot.

Teng drils the shot though, tying the game and sending it to overtime, where the Archers go on to win.


A few thoughts:

• Ateneo had Sumalinog, their best one-on-one defender, on Vostoros, which is probably the right call. The combo-guard took and made the most triples of any Archer in the FilOil, and normed 27% from downtown.
• On the other hand, Tiongson, a sub-par defender, was assigned to take Revilla, and as seen above, Revilla actually managed to lose him when he ran baseline. Nico Elorde should have been put in, as he was immensely effective when tasked to shadow the DLSU point guards.
• Ateneo threw multiple defenders on Teng throughout the game, and it seemed clear that Ryan Buenafe was the best match-up. Ravena has a history of asking to take on his former National Team teammates though (Amer, Ferrer), and Buenafe could have been gassed after playing the majority of the fourth quarter. And if I were La Salle and saw Buenafe on Teng, I would run Teng through as many screens as possible to wear down the former Finals MVP.
• La Salle in theory could have kept running this play over and over and over, until time expired or they had worn down one of the Ateneo defenders. It's a well-drawn up play by Coach Abanilla.
• At the same time, you have to think if Ateneo was going to let anyone on the floor take a triple, it'd be Teng. Prior to this game, Teng was just 3-of-10 from downtown, and the scouting report had his outside shot as his biggest weakness. As DLSU coach Abanilla said in the post-game, they caught a huge break that the shot went in.
• Should Ateneo have turned the game into a battle at the foul line? That was the strategy I thought they should have employed, given the Archers' woes at the line. La Salle finished the game 13-of-40 from the line, while Ateneo was 14-of-21. The Eagles could have opted to start fouling at the 10 second mark and taken their chances from there.

Watch the entire play unfold here: