The UP Fighting Maroons needed to dig deep late in the second half to earn a winning start to their title defense at the FilOil EcoOil Preseason Cup.
The UP Fighting Maroons fended off a comeback from the NU Bulldogs in the second half of their FilOil EcoOil Preseason Cup match, 82-74, at the Playtime FilOil Centre on Monday afternoon.
Veteran guard Gerry Abadiano pulled out all the stops to avert a meltdown for UP, who led by as much as 13 points at halftime, 44-31.
But a scoring run by NU in the third quarter trimmed the deficit to two, 58-60, after a layup from PJ Palacielo with 1:24 ticks left in the third quarter.
UP then quickly scored six straight points before Palacielo regained distance to make it a six-point game heading into the final canto, 66-60.
In the fourth quarter, it was all NU to start the action as they held UP scoreless in more than five minutes of play, even seizing the lead momentarily, 67-66, after a Ken Padrones layup with 4:31 left in the ball game.
However, Abadiano caught fire as he scored all the points in UP's 10-2 run that flipped the script on the Bulldogs, 69-76, with 2:50 remaining.
While a Steve Nash Enriquez triple made things interesting late in the ball game as NU got within five, 74-79, with a minute and a half left, Abadiano once again took over with an and-one opportunity to reach the final score with 32 seconds left.
Abadiano scored 13 of his 16 points on 4-of-6 shooting. He also had three rebounds and two assists.
Starting point guard Rey Remogat added 12 markers to go along with two rebounds and four assists.
Foreign student-athlete Francis Nnoruka also flexed his skills with 12 points and six rebounds.
Palacielo did the heavy lifting for the Bulldogs in the losing effort with 20 points. He also had two rebounds and one assist.