XS Basketball Nirvana
by Henry Liao ’72
This has been a very good year for the Xavier School Alumni Association.
Supported by the AAXS and Mighty Sports Association, Xavier School went unbeaten in each of the four tournaments participated in by our alma mater Metro Manila Tiong Lian Basketball Association (9-0), 85th Philippine Cultural High School tournament in the 31 years old-and-under division (7-0), our team was composed of alumni players, including one professional).
We also swept the two divisions in the 12th Chiang San Ching Memorial Cup 22 years old-and-under Division I (9-0, our players consisted of players from the Tiong Lian runner-up team of 2005 like Rejan Lee and the TL championship teams of 2006 such as Woody Co and Charles Tiu and 2008) and the Juniors school teams-only Division II (10-0).
Overall, we went 35-0 in those four tournaments.
Xavier beat St. Stephen¹s High School (which played with active pro Christian Luanzon), 70-63, in the PCHS 31 years-and-under tournament. In the Division I finals of the Chiang San Ching Memorial Cup, we beat Chiang Kai Shek by more than 20 points. In the Division II of the same event, we got past a strong Hope Christian High School team (beefed up by four recruits from Far Eastern University HS) by an 83-76 score.
The Division I title was our third in a row and sixth overall in the 12-year tournament. Our head coach, Caesar Wongchuking (Batch 1982), earned his 5th Coach of the Year award. Woody Co, a member of the 2006 TL title squad who now plays for UP in the UAAP, was voted the tournament¹s MVP. Co and Rejan Lee were named to the tournament¹s Mythical First Team.
The Division II title was our second consecutive in the tournament. The head coach was Lito Vergara, who led the XS Juniors to the TL crown in 2008 and 2009. It was Vergara¹s final tour of duty as his contract is not being renewed for reasons that are unclear until now.
One member of the Division II team, which was composed of players that will likely suit up for Juniors Golden Stallions in various tournaments for the 2009-10 school year, was Richard Go, the son of our batchmate Ramon Go.
Richard stands 6-4. According to Mongo, who found time to attend the finals at the CKSC high school gym last Sunday, May 10, Richard grew up that tall because of his heavy milk intake during his early years. Mongo¹s younger son, Raymond, was also in attendance. I jokingly told Raymond that his surname might not be Go, but Gutierrez. And Mongo retorted that he¹s not Eddie. (Actor Eddie Gutierrez has twin sons Richard and Raymond).
Actually, our alma mater has been blessed with basketball domination and perfection for the past nine months.
The XS Juniors also went unbeaten en route to their third straight title in the 2008 Philippine Youth Athletic Association (PAYA) tournament. They also did not lose a single game en route to their third consecutive title in the San Juan Inter-High School competitions last November.
Okay, the XS Aspirants squad dropped a pair of games (both to Chiang Kai Shek, once in the elimination round and the other in Game Two of the best-of-three finals) in the 2009 Tiong Lian competitions. But the Golden Stallions eventually beat CKSC in the decisive Game Three of the TL Aspirants finals to claim an unprecedented seventh straight championship.
This hoops junkie has been a witness to this XS basketball nirvana of late, having made stops at odd places such as the oven-hot San Juan Gym (for the San Juan Inter-HS tournament) and familiar places such as the old Xavier School wooden basketball court (for the PAYA games), Uno gym (for the Tiong Lian games), San Andres (Manila) gym (for the 31 years-and-under event) and the San Beda College and Chiang Kai Shek College basketball courts (for the Chiang San Ching competitions).
