May 27 ’11: NIGERIAN Christopher Okpe played all six of his minutes in the fourth quarter and scored the go-ahead basket on an assist by Andrian Celada as Arellano University ended its 2011 FilOil Flying V Pre-Season Premier Cup campaign on a high note, beating the University of Santo Tomas Growling Tigers, 64-63 last May 27 at the FilOil Flying V Arena in San Juan.

UST led all the way until an and-one play by Celada tied the game at 62-each with a minute and two seconds left to play. On the other end, Cameroonian Karim Abdul was fouled after trying to put back a missed triple by Clark Bautista, but the rookie big man hit just front end of his two charities, leaving the door open for Okpe’s heroics.

The Growling Tigers actually had a chance to win the game, coming out of a timeout with 19.7 seconds left, but Jeric Teng missed a triple, resulting in cheers from the grey shirted Chiefs. “We’ll use this win to further leap [sic] the morale of the players. Sana madala namin sa NCAA,” said Chiefs head coach Leo Isaac.