No Records for Dalupan (Sports Weekly, 1976)

Sports Weekly Magazine

November 19-26, 1976

Bitoy Bonifacio

 

 

This year will wind up as one of the most fruitful for coach Baby Dalupan, but the cunning Crispa team mentor would be looking back at 1976 with diminished fondness.

 

            Dalupan actually has a lot to cheer about. There is the second straight NCAA basketball crown he helped win for Ateneo last month, the PBA All-Filipino title and the expected (at this reporting) PBA Open Conference plum. But despite all, Dalupan is likely to shake his seasoned head when he reminisces about year 1976. It is a year of near-misses – at big basketball records.

 

            Dalupan failed to keep a date with basketball history when he missed scoring an unprecedented 14-game sweep of the NCAA basketball series by a hairline (no thanks to eventual runner-up San Beda); then last Tuesday, he again failed at a record try when Toyota coach Dante Silverio prevented him from achieving what could have been the first ever three-game sweep of a PBA best-of-five title series.

 

            So, 1976 will go down as just another year for Dalupan who has been so used to clinching crowns, although often the hard way.

 

            However, this is also likely to be an all-revealing year for Dalupan as far as the Crispa lineup is concerned. He is more convinced now that the Redmanizers will always be the Redmanizers. They can’t be expected to clinch, try their best, whenever the odds are on them.

 

            Fighting hard all the way once favored would be terribly un-Crispa-like. Or winning a major crown trouble-free, for that matter.

 

 

 

            In their quest for a third straight PBA title alone, Dalupan had to patch up a series of team troubles – with fatherly backing of Don Pablo Floro and son Danny Floro, Crispa team manager – in order to maintain their status as the country’s number one ballclub. First, there was the problem with Cyrus Mann, the prodigious team pillar – who, at the earlier stage of his stint here, had refused to stay put, travelled back and forth to the United States, while his teammates were left doubting about his worth and intentions. Fed up, Dalupan gave Mann an ultimatum – stay put or pack up and go home. Mann, roused to his right pro basketball senses, is definitely playing one of the finest seasons of his young career.

 

            Similarly challenging was the overly-publicized team troubles, which had threatened to go out of hand. Dalupan insisted on his own way, and the problem was promptly resolved.

 

            William Adornado, his skipper and most reliable point-producer, injured his knee. This could have proved crippling had it happened to a lesser team and to a lesser coach. But Dalupan solved the Adornado problem when he fashioned out new plays – with emphasis on mobility and teammanship – to make Crispa doubly deadly at the clutches.

 

            What Dalupan would not however get rid of is the often suspiciously, lethargic performance of his mainstays whenever the team plays an overwhelming favorite.

 

            What’s commendable about Dalupan is that, despite the troubles, and his countless titles, he has also grown into a good loser.

 

            In their latest setback – in game number three of the PBA Open best-of-five series – Dalupan did not blame the referees, although there were some obviously stupid calls which had helped crippled their bid for a record sweep of the championship. He instead blamed the setback on his boys, which he said, failed to sustain their fierce pace.

 

            “Lumamig na naman sa huli,” Dalupan explained amid funeral silence in the Crispa dugout.

 

            Coach Dante Silverio, on the other hand, also had reasons to cry over officiating, but he overdid it when he blamed their two crucial setbacks in the finals on referees.

 

            “We were playing against seven men,” complained the usually cool Silverio. “We could not win any game, no matter what, if the referees continue to pick on my boys.”

 

 

 

            Sadly though, Silverio’s distrust for the referees had also affected his boys. They too became touchy on the floor, protesting every call – no matter what.

 

            “Kailangan diyan (sa Toyota), magpatayo ng sarili nilang liga,” said a disenchanted sideliner.

 

            They were not supposed to, but Toyota fans blamed the referees for the deterioration of Robert Jaworski’s temper in the series. A seasoned internationalist, and a top contender for the MVP award in the last All-Filipino series, Jaworski brought out anew some of his nasty amateur habits – barging his way with a karate kick, raking opponents with a fist, etc.

 

            And once, as reported by Recah Trinidad in the Evening Express, he refused Bernard Fabiosa’s peace offer when the Crispa sentinel extended a friendly hand after the game.

 

            “Siya na ang nanuntok, siya pa ang ayaw makipagkamay,” Fabiosa said of the Big J.

 

            But enough of that. Back to the ballgame.

 

            Crispa for the first time in the series, suddenly found itself sorely missing Bogs Adornado when the fabulous Redmanizer scoring machine cooled off, chug-chug-chugged in the closing quarter of Game 3.

 

            Suddenly, the Redmanizers were in trouble again. But, unfortunately for Coach Silverio, a Redmanizer in trouble is terribly hard to contain.

The Night Crispa Got Off the Floor (Sports Weekly, 1976)

Sports Weekly Magazine

November 5-12, 1976

On the Line, Vic Villafranca

 

 

            It was a game that Crispa and Toyota needed to win like Racquel Welch needs pads to make everybody in the room sit up and take notice.

 

            Oh sure, being the last game in both teams’ qualifying round schedule, they had to play it. But if at all, the only thing that was at stake in so far as both teams were concerned because they earlier had made the semifinals, was something called prestige. Which means that whoever loses gets nothing more than the whole exercise except a blow to the ballclub’s pride.

 

            Still, the way Danny Floro’s Crispa Denims took the floor Tuesday last week, one would think that if it was not the whole championship that was at stake, it was the entire Crispa plant in Pasig, Rizal. Or all the baubles in Philippine basketball’s most bejeweled ballclub.

 

            No one in the Crispa lineup really said it out loud but the feeling was there just the same that if there was one game that the Denims had to win, this was their final encounter with Toyota before the round of four begins.

 

            And so who really cares if on the other side of the fence, Dante Silverio were to behave as nonchalantly, as unperturbed as a race driver taking the family wagon on a spin in the countryside? Or if Dante couldn’t care one whit whether the Comets were to hobble out of the court later on looking every bit like a bunch of cats that just got out of the rain?

 

            Let Dante relax, let him enjoy the luxury of going through a stint on the bench without as much a stick of Pall Mall reds in his hands, but for Crispa, none of that “I couldn’t care less” attitude, none of that, “Look Ma, No Hands, No Pressure” stuff.

 

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            But then, looking back at it all, Crispa’s performance record in the three-month long qualifying round, it is not difficult not to understand why the Denims’ apparent edginess over a game which they could drop and still not miss a step going into the semis.

 

 

 

            As the qualifying round’s performance record will show, the Denims almost have to make it to the round of four through the side door. And at one stretch in their lurching, shaky spurt to the semis, they gave a lot of people the impression that any similarity between this Denim team and that which won the first PBA conference for 1976 couldn’t even be faintly coincidental.

 

            Eventually, they got to join Toyota, U/Tex and Royal Tru Orange in the payoff round, but only because elsewhere in the league, the other round of four aspirants were blowing up their chances to get in the semis and they were able to stop their skid to comedy in time.

 

            But as to that old question – Has Crispa still got the old sock? – the Denims never got to provide a categorical answer.

 

            And so now, with the qualifying rounds just ended, Crispa has one last chance to show that it’s too early to refer to the Denims in the past tense, that despite their internal troubles, they still possess the stuff out of which champs are made.

 

            What the Denims did Tuesday last week to prevent the off-season messages of condolences from piling up on Danny’s desk was an almost storybook example of what a team suddenly imbued with a desire to win could do when up against the wall.

 

            Although decidedly crippled by Bogs Adornado’s absence, the Denims played like the Crispa ballclub of old, almost like a team possessed as they cut down the mighty Comets to size and win by a margin that looked as if they didn’t run up against Toyota but against the second team of the JASM’s girls’ basketball team.

 

            Predictably, that uplifting triumph earned for Crispa the raves of both the experts and the fans. In his column, “Take Five” in the Express, Tony Siddayao, all but came out singing as he wrote,”….and now Crispa is back in business as a respected contender, an image that had been in bad need of repair.”

 

             Indeed, that was how the whole thing to many, until two days later, at the start of the round of four, when Crispa, playing as if half of its lineup was in a trance or had a bad case of sniffles, played hot and cold to blow a 106-101 decision to the U/Tex Wranglers.

 

            It was an awful start for a machine that seemed to have finally dusted off its kinks and it’s a good thing that instead of just one straight series, the semis will go double round robin. Which means that whaever it is that has made the Denims play like the contenders that they are one night and like a bunch of old ladies the next night, Coach Baby Dalupan will still be able to patch. And Danny Floro to remedy with that now well-known locker room performance of his where, according to those who have caught it, Danny minces no words – nor promises – to get the adrenalin pumping once more in the Denims’ bloodstream.

 

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            Actually, in trying to get to the bottom of Crispa’s dismal performance last Thursday, Danny Floro need only to review the Denims’ scorebook to know why his team took it flush on the chin against U/Tex.

 

 

 

            As the books showed and likewise their behavior on the court, three Denims – Atoy Co, Bernie Fabiosa and Philip Cezar – hardly were in the game. Atoy, the Denim who provided the big sock in Crispa’s runaway win over Toyota last week with a game-high 25, could only put together eight points while Fabiosa was only good for four. And Cezar/ Would you believe an apparently healthy Philip only coming through with two points?

 

            It does happen, of course, that even the best of players hit an off-night, but not to the extent – as in the cases of Co, Cezar and Fabiosa – that their performances take a swing from the sublime to the ridiculous and all of a sudden – as if they forgot their shooting irons in the dugout on their way out – they run around like a clutch of kittens caught in a traffic maze.

 

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            Obviously, the United States has just about had it in Olympic competition. In preparation for the Moscow Games in 1980, the U.S., according to Director Don Miller of the US Olympic Committee, plans to spend no less than $10 million for development alone.

 

            The sum, which entails a considerable easing of the USOC’s purse strings, is unprecedented in the history of American preparation for the Olympiad. It represents, in fact, a 250 increase in previous developmental programs of the USOC.

 

            Why all of a sudden the U.S> decided to pull out all the stops in preparation for Moscow, Miller didn’t say, but observers feel that the USOC shift in emphasis toward development appears to reflect a growing concern over the continuously improving performance level of the Soviet Union, East Germany and other Eastern European states.

 

            In short, the U.S. is getting fed up finishing second, third, or worse in events which in past Olympiads, American entries used to dominate and win with the ease and aplomb of a New Yorker munching a MacDonald hamburger.

 

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            In finishing 106^th in a field of more than 2,000 entries in the New York City Marathon, Philippine long-distance king Victor Idava broke his old national record of 2:38.23, running the 42-kilometer route in two hours and 37 minutes flat.

 

            Nice. But not really so much when one compares that with the time posted by the winner, Bill Rodgers, who covered the distance in 2:10.10, almost a full 20 minutes faster than Idava’s time, which means that by the time Idava hit the NY city suburbs, Rodgers must have been out of the showers already and all dolled up to pick up his prize.

 

            Undoubtedly, Idava has still a long, long way to go before he succeeds in his bid to be within screaming distance of the world’s best in the marathon at the end of another long race. And at the rate he is going, it looks as if his only chance of giving Rodgers, Shorter and company a scare is if these guys are to take a lunch break at the halfway mark.

 

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            He can’t run now and neither can he walk since a vehicular accident 10 years ago rendered him invalid and consigned him to spend the rest of his life in a wheelchair. But Alex Cabusor, once the country’s long-distance man, believes he can still do something to help the DYSD in its sports development program.

 

            Like another track standout of the past, Inocencia Solis, Alex, who now lives in Bagiuo City, a short sprint away from the finish line of the Baguio Athletic Center, would like DYSD Undersecretary Edilberto Duavit that anytime the DYSD needs his services, he’s available.

 

            Cabusora’s offer is in response to Duavit’s call for competent and experienced personnel to man the various phases of its sports development program. As this department had predicted, Duavit need not really go to great lengths to find the people he’s looking for. All he needs to do is put out a distress signal.

 

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Quotes Unquote –

 

Coach Baby Dalupan after Crispa lost to U/Tex: “Mahirap talaga ang basketball.”

 

Coach Dante Silverio, following Toyota’s first win in the PBA round of four: “We’ve got to make new moves because our opponents are watching us very closely.”

 

Bill Veeck, White Sox owner, describing Dodger owner Walter O’ Malley: “He’s the only man I know Dale Carnegie would hit in the mouth.”

 

Tommy Bolt after blowing a two-foot putt: “I know you all expect me to blow up and say something bad at this point, but I’ll be darned if I will.”