Not This Time: CV Hunter’s Road to Cebu Stops at Dao
By the numbers, CV Hunter Basketball did almost everything required to win its Rising Stars qualifier. By the scoreboard, it lost 67-64. The gap between those two truths sat 15 feet from the basket.
THE CASE FOR CV HUNTER
Strip away the final score and the Hunters controlled the game's most important battles. They won the possession war, forcing 28 Mic's Team A turnovers while committing 21, and turned 17 steals into transition pressure all afternoon. They owned the offensive glass, grabbing 22 offensive rebounds to Mic's Team A's 13, which kept possessions alive and fed a paint attack that outscored Mic's 52-46. They made more field goals, 29 to 26.
In a game played almost entirely inside the arc, that is usually a winning formula. Only one three-pointer fell all game, Jhon Marvin Macarayo's in the first quarter. It was worth exactly the final margin.
WHERE IT SLIPPED AWAY
The Hunters went 6-of-29 from the free-throw line, 21 percent. Even an ordinary 50 percent night would have produced eight or nine more points, more than enough to flip a three-point result. Mic's Team A was hardly sharp from the stripe at 14-of-28, but those extra eight makes were the difference.
The middle quarters told the rest of the story. Mic's Team A shot 58 percent in the third quarter (11-of-19), turning a four-point halftime lead into a 57-47 cushion. The Hunters' defense then tightened dramatically, holding Mic's to 3-of-14 shooting in the fourth, but the climb back started from too far down.
THE COMEBACK
Down 13 early in the fourth, CV Hunter answered with a 9-0 run, the longest of the game. Kent Ivan Calcaben scored back-to-back baskets, and Luke Angelo Monteron's layup with 53 seconds left cut the deficit to 65-64. It took free throws in the final 45 seconds for Mic's Team A to close it out.
THE PERFORMERS
Mark Necie Apoyon was the game's most disruptive defender, finishing with 18 points, 8 steals and 4 assists, a two-way line that would stand out at any level. Vince Marlou Calbario battled inside for 11 rebounds, seven on the defensive end, before fouling out. Calcaben, Shaun Ethan Dote and James Isidore Acompañado each added 9 points.
THE TAKEAWAY
CV Hunter's profile is a contender's profile: they defend, they rebound and they attack the paint. Teams built like that win more games than they lose. Saturday was the exception, decided by the one skill every young player can sharpen with repetition.
Not this time. But the foundation is there, and the Hunters will be back.
#SanoHoops