An ugly brawl featuring John Amores of Jose Rizal University marred the 71-51 victory of College of Saint Benilde in Season 95 National Collegiate Athletic Association on Tuesday at the Filoil EcoOil Centre in San Juan.
Amores, a third-year forward, lost his cool in the final 3:22 with the Blazers up by 20 points.
He was seen complaining a call after a scramble for rebound position with Chris Flores.
But after the officials ignored him, he charged at a fan at the back of the Blazers’ bench, prompting Mark Sango to throw a punch to prevent him from doing damage.
All hell broke loose when Amores unleashed a haymaker at Jimboy Pasturan and Taine Davis that knocked them down. He even pushed Oczon as he was getting restrained before coaches, team staff and arena security personnel escorted him out of the playing court.
It wasn’t the first time for the rugged forward to get involved in a scuffle.
In fact, he was slapped with an indefinite ban in the Universities and Colleges Basketball League after punching Mark Gil Belmonte of University of the Philippines last July.
Amores personally reached out to Belmonte through teammate Gerry Abadiano to apologize, but it left the Fighting Maroon with severe injury to his lower gums and lips.
James Pasturan fired 18 points four rebounds and three assists while Will Gozum and Rob Nayve chipped in 15 and 12 markers for the Blazers before NCAA management committee officials decided to halt the match.
NCAA executives are still deliberating on the possible sanction on erring players at press time.
Meanwhile, Emilio Aguinaldo College finally broke a four-game losing streak after a 59-53 win over University of Perpetual Help System Dalta.
Art Cosa dropped 14 points and eight rebounds for the Generals, who weathered a furious fourth-quarter rally from the Altas.
EAC was already up by 14, 53-39 in the fourth quarter when Rey Barcuma led Perpetual to a 14-2 run to trim the lead to two, 53-55, with 48.5 seconds remaining.
Joshua Tolentino then sank a crucial jumper with 18.6 ticks left before Cosa drained both of his three throws to pick up the Generals’ second win of the season.
EAC head coach Oliver Bunyi said the team kept on using the zone defense to book the victory.
“We stuck with our zone defense. We can’t go man-to-man on them because they’re taller and stronger,” Bunyi said.
“We told them we will live and die on the zone defense and it worked.”
JC Luciano flirted for a double-double, firing 12 points and nine rebounds for the Generals, who now have a 2-13 card.
The scores:
First game:
EAC (59) – Cosa 14, Luciano 12, Balowa 10, Liwag 6, Dominguez 6, Tolentino 5, Cosejo 4, Umpad 2, Quinal 0, Ad. Doria 0, An. Doria 0, Angeles 0, Bacud 0.
PERPETUAL (53) – Barcuma 12, Omega 11, Nitura 8, Razon 5, Abis 3, Egan 3, Roque 3, Flores 2, Boral 2, Movida 2, Pagaran 0, Nunez 0, Cuevas 0, Martel 0.
QUARTERS: 19-13, 34-26, 47-39, 59-53.
