Patriots are ABL champions

THE Philippine Patriots were crowned the inaugural champions of the Asean Basketball League (ABL) yesterday after beating Satria Muda BritAma 75-67 in Game 3 of the best-of-five final series to take a 3-0 unassailable lead at the BritAma Arena in Indonesia yesterday.

Having won the first two games at home, it was the first time that the Patriots have ventured into enemy territory for the finals.

Satria Muda coach Fictor Roring's hopes of the home crowd serving as the 'sixth player' were dashed as the Patriots eventually flew back home with a win in the end.

The champions' American import Gabe Freeman was not at his usual best last night, limited to only 17 points and 19 rebounds but his compatriot Jason Dixon shone bright in Jakarta, recording 28 points and 12 rebounds for his 16th double-double of the season.

The Satria Muda's duo of Alex Hartman and Nakiea Miller, on the other hand, could only get 14 and 13 points respectively.

Louie Alas, the Patriots coach, credits the win to the team's defence.

"The whole season we really emphasised on defence, especially in this series," said Alas after their victory last night.

Having won Game 1 (at 78-68) and Game 2 (72-53), the Patriots only needed one more win to secure the ABL crown.

The home crowd spurred Satria Muda to an early nine-point lead, at 14-5.

However, the hosts suffered a setback when Miller was poked in the eye by Patriots forward Jerwin Gaco.

The Patriots took advantage of his absence and fought back to get a four-point lead (35-31) at half-time.

Starting more aggressively, the Patriots made a 7-0 run to end the third quarter with a 13-point lead.

Satria Muda never gave up though and in the fourth quarter Rony Gunawan scored two triples to cut the Patriots' lead down to eight points (70-62).

Yet the Patriots' offence was too hot to handle and Gaco's net with only 48 seconds left sealed the victory for the champions.

Yesterday's win caps the perfect debut season for the Philippine Patriots, showing their superiority by first topping the six-team table during the regular season and ending it by claiming a 3-0 victory in the ABL finals.

"This has been a fantastic start to our inaugural season and the league can only get stronger from here on out," said Kuhan Foo, the chief executive officer of the ABL on the ABL website.

"We've already made a huge impact with our games televised live across the Southeast Asian nations and streamed live on the internet in Europe, the United States and North Asia. Were looking at adding more teams to the league (next season) and we are working closely with the Southeast Asian Basketball Association to make this league stronger in its second season which will start in October." The Brunei Times