JEDDAH, 1 February — Mersal Village-Jungleland topped the single round elimination of the Safari Metal Work Friendship Games going 6-1 in seven games as they ended their first round campaign via a heart-pounding 77-74 win over Gillette Mach3.
In another very hotly contested and highly-thrilling night-cap, Jeddah Knigthz scrambled past PD-Michelin, 89-78, for an all-important win setting up a wide open race for at least five teams still in a hunt for semifinals berth going to the ultimate pair of matches this Friday.
Jungleland’s lofty billing even if point guard Alex Vidal was still unable to play remains quizzical but that should make the Mersal Village management headed by Sheik Haytem Nassier proud. With the way the maroons are playing, Mersal Jungleland enjoys the kind of publicity and recognition, which comes as a pleasant surprise to the boyish coach Egay Cunanan and team consultant Alvin Bautista. The duo pooled their combined efforts in order to assemble a formidable squad even if they have to scrape funding for the team themselves.
Metal Work Co. headed by Ali Mohammed Badreddine and SCL project manager Abdullah S. Al-Shamasi stand as the principal sponsors. Minor sponsors are: ABS-CBN The Filipino Channel, International Food & Consumables Co., exclusive distributor of Snapple Juice, Al-Hussaini & Co.(Seiko Watch) and Basamh Trading (Goody ).
Gillette Mach3’s coach Monching Constantino showed anxiety as their failure to land a semifinals berth outright is now hinged to a must-win situation against a vastly upgraded Engineering-Jeddah Thai squad which also badly needs a win to earn a 4-3 card.
The Blademakers would have to show up complete with key players Leo Almoite, Bill Projo, Torres, Topper del Rosario and William Rosales plus sixth man Romy Tamayo against Engineering that boast of the likes of six-footer Margate and Art Oliva in its line-up.
In the homestretch Mersal’s defense clamped down mightily against the Blademakers with seldom-used six-foot three Wael Asharaf making six swats in the fourth quarter as he formed a triple tower threat alongside Pat Cecilio and Junjay Quinito for Mersal Village who accounted for 22 points each. The bench support of Mersal proved to be crucial as high-leaping Frederick Suarez came through with clutch six points, the same production made by Asharaf.
Heavy-Equipment-Jeddah Knightz’ victory earned them a 3-3- win loss slate and needs to win its final assignment against Miyabe-Abe (4-2) to gain an outside chance, a loss would automatically boot them out and look for the next conference slated March 15, 2002.
The Knightz were trailing from a high of 16 points late in the second quarter but came alive on a rare four-point play by Jim Tomas and two crucial three-pointers by Jason Villanueva in the third to wrest momentum. Villanueva led the Knightz with 26 points. Tomas had 14 and Nabus relived his fiery performance with 25 markers while crowd-favorite Edwin Ronquilllo played quality minutes nailing 6 points before fouling out of the game.
Jeddah Knightz shoots for another victory against Miyabe-Abe in the first game while Jeddah-Thai Engineering aims for an upset against KAIA Rim Inter-commercial Open champion Gillette Mach3 of the last and final doubleheader offering prior to the crossover semifinals.
PD-Michelin’s loss fixed their standing at 4-3 and is hopeful that both Miyabe-Abe and Gillette hurdle their opponents to gain a seat into the crossover semifinals. However, if either one of the two teams gets humbled, Michelin’s chance would be in jeopardy as a minimum of three and a maximum of five teams would share identical 4-3 cards. Quotient system will then be applied to determine the other three semifinalists aside from Mersal-Jungleland.
