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The brand new season Cebu Schools Athletic Foundation Inc. (Cesafi) basketball tournament continues to sizzle as yesterday's playdate saw another barnburner in the seniors division with the University of Southern Philippines Foundation (USPF) Panthers escaping the Don Bosco Greywolves, 88-83, in overtime at the Cebu Coliseum.
A day after the exciting showdown between the University of San Jose-Recoletos (USJR) Jaguars and the University of San Carlos (USC) Warriors, which saw the former come out on top by a single point, 67-66, it was the turn of the Panthers and the Greywolves to put up another nail-biting performance.
The Panthers proved to be the steadier squad as they took advantage of the foul-plagued Greywolves in the extra session.
With regulation ending at 78-all, the two squads continued to battle tooth-and-nail until the Panthers uncorked a 7-0 run that was kicked off by a stunning slam dunk from the Cesafi's reigning slam dunk champion, Elwin Durano. They capped off that stretch by hitting five consecutive free-throws.
Don Bosco was not able to recover from that afterwards.
The Panthers appeared to be on their way to the win as the Greywolves' top playmaker Celso Colegado fouled out with 2:59 left in the game while in the middle of scoring 16 of his 24 points in the final canto.
USPF capitalized on that by engaging on a 10-2 run that was capped off by two free-throws by Nuevo Filoteo that gave them a 78-75 lead with just 12 seconds remaining.
However, on the next possession, Allain delos Santos made the most out of a defensive blunder by Filoteo as he zoomed down the court and canned the game-tying trifecta with six ticks left on the clock. USPF was not able to get a shot off as time expired.
Filoteo scored a game-high 27 points while Ellison Rivera added 13 markers. Rookie Fritz Dacalos added 11 markers.
In the juniors division, the defending champions University of Cebu (UC) Baby Webmasters got their title defense off to a rousing start after defeating the University of San Carlos (USC) Baby Warriors, 95-86. The University of the Visayas (UV) Baby Lancers also beat the Don Bosco Baby Greywolves in convincing fashion, 93-61.
